


Hey Wanna Watch Me Get Kidnapped, Wanna Watch Me Do It Again

by cheorryeclipse



Category: Flesh & Bones
Genre: s2e13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-29
Updated: 2019-06-29
Packaged: 2020-05-29 14:58:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,750
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19402678
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cheorryeclipse/pseuds/cheorryeclipse
Summary: One of the biggest F.B.I felons breaks out of prison and Luke Miller's only hope for tracking him down is his sleep-deprived, forensic anthropologist friend, Morrigan Star.





	Hey Wanna Watch Me Get Kidnapped, Wanna Watch Me Do It Again

“Hey Wanna Watch Me Get Kidnapped? Wanna Watch Me Do It Again?”  
April 13, 2019

Morrigan Star's deathly crusted eyes dragged themselves across the F.B.I offices. Agents were bustling and rushing about, more than usual, Morrigan noted. Voices talked over each other, all blending together in a beautiful catastrophe of noise and symphony. Morrigan could sense the air was tense.

For a woman who hasn't slept in days and hadn't been back to her house in weeks, Morrigan fared pretty well. She was able to catch a quick shower in the lab’s decontamination room and always kept a spare change (in this case a week’s worth) of clothing in her office. She was sitting at Yin’s desk, spinning back and forth and watching with wide, vibrating eyes.

“Have you been drinking caffeine to stay awake again, Morrigan?”

Morrigan turned to look at her F.B.I agent partner who had come up to her, Luke Miller. He looked pretty frazzled, Morrigan observed. His fluffy blonde hair was tousled like he had been constantly running a hand through it, which is probably what he was doing (nervous tick). His peach skin looks dry and his black eyes were tired. He hadn't slept last night. But to be fair, neither had Morrigan. Though she ran a comb through her long peony hair and washed it, it cried for conditioner and shampoo. The dark rings under her eyes were especially dark today on her deep brown skin, being highlighted by her straight bangs casting a shadow over her golden upturned eyes.

“Red Bull,” Morrigan corrected trying to compose herself in front of Luke but it was painfully obvious she had drunk lots and lots of caffeine. Her golden eyes were darting everywhere and she swore she could feel her sharp cheekbones and each individual freckle vibrate with energy. Morrigan quickly looked at the file Luke was holding. Marco Walker.

Luke gave her a disapproving look. “That's still caffeine, Morrigan,” Luke shifted his weight. “No bones for you to examine back at the lab?”

“Nope! Lola isn't calling for a forensic anthropologist today!”

“Then why are you here?” Luke asked. “You're not an agent, you are not required to be here. You look like hell. Have you even gone home in the past few days?”

“Have you?” Morrigan grinned as she moved the spinning seat from side to side. Luke didn't say anything, Morrigan sighed and came up with an all-new excuse for her newfound tired look. “I have to stay up to protect this world from the shadow monsters, if I go to sleep I risk them taking over the world.” _Add that to the list of ‘having lots of paperwork, being back on Japanese time or having to sort files.’_

“What's been keeping you up, anyway?” Luke asked. Morrigan puckered her lips.

“What's been keeping you up?” Morrigan asked, a wide grin spreading across her face. “I'll tell if you tell.”

Luke's disappointment was unmoving from his face. “Just get some sleep, Morrigan.’’ He said as he walked off, shaking his head. Morrigan watched as he went over and joined the F.B.I’s top agent, Nimah Rose. Nimah, a rural-born Texan, sat across the room cycling through rubbing at her temples every few seconds, repositioning her sliding blue hijab and blinking her round burnt orange eyes to keep herself awake. Her dark brown skin looks greasy under the fluorescent light, and her wrinkled suit didn't seem to be doing her appearance any favors.

Marco Walker, Marco Walker, Marco Walker. That name just kept showing up, huh? Who was he?

Taking advantage of the fact that the more responsible agents being occupied, Morrigan got up and strode over the F.B.I head psychologist Nora Adelina-Elvita Bell. Nora was positioned at one of the whiteboards with a bunch of maps and, she was guessing, Marco Walker. He was a fairly well put together man. He had deep brown skin with blue undertones, much like Morrigan herself, a buzz cut and was wearing a suit in his picture. She felt like she had seen that man before...

“Hey, Nora!” Morrigan greeted. Nora turned away from the board and looking Morrigan, her appearance by far the best in the entire room. Her makeup was done beautifully, bright red lips smiled back at Morrigan. Her curly brown hair fell around her squared, freckled face perfectly, making the light brown tint stand out. And of course, her Gucci belt and shirt made an appearance in her everyday outfit office.

“Hello, Morrigan!” Nora greeted.

“What's going on?” Morrigan asked.

“Dangerous international criminal just broke out of prison,” Nora shrugged, waving off the severity of the situation. “We’re tasked with catching him,”

“Who is he?” Morrigan asked, hoping she would throw her a bone.

Nora cocked her head to the side and blinked those perfect false lashes. “You don't remember The Family Jewel?”

Morrigan thought for a second, scanning her memory for any mention of the name. Remembering one news story she had caught. “Oh yeah! I remember that, he broke into a mom and pop jewelry store and killed both of them. He was then caught because the daughter came in and smashed a vase over his head. They said it was an open and shut case. I believe the newscaster was wearing a red blouse that day.” Morrigan tapped her chin in thought.

Nora scoffed. “That's the jist of it.”

“So where are you guys on finding him?”

Nora looked at Morrigan apologetically. “Sorry Morrigan, I officially can't tell you any details of the case unless you're brought on, and there's no skeletons involved in this one.”

“Maybe in the closet,” Morrigan hummed in disappointment but her real attention was pulled elsewhere. Luke and Nimah looked like they were getting ready to go somewhere. Somewhere serious based on their facial expressions. Making a split second decision, she decided to follow them. “I'll just go back to the lab then.” She lied to Nora, quickly going after the two agents leaving.

You would think tailing two F.B.I agents would be harder; but for Morrigan, it was basically kindergarteners play. Having memorized the F.B.I handbook she had all the tips & tricks in her brain, plus she may have temporarily borrowed (stolen) Luke's car. (Hey, it wasn't her fault! He's the one who has it where it's so easily broken into, what was she going to do? Not steal it?)

Luckily, as The Calamity, she could stay back extremely far and just follow Luke’s foreboding energy. He just had a very trackable energy attached to him, she had come to find. (Again, what was she going to do? Not tail him with her God-like powers that can be used to destroy all the planar worlds to see what kind of breakfast he gets in the morning?)

She had followed them to an old abandoned parking garage way out in the boonies, it was overrun with grass as tall as Morrigan, which was tall. Parking her (Luke’s) car around the corner she jumped out and stealthily made her way to follow them.

Morrigan did her best to avoid every small branch and crunchy leaf on the path, making her dance around on the dirt path like an idiot. She stopped behind a tree and watched as Nimah and Luke walked into the old building. After the large rusted door clanked shut, Morrigan followed.

The inside of the parking garage was dark, dusty, damp and another describing word starting with d. Morrigan could still make out the blue of Nimah's hijab and the gold of Luke's fluffy hair from the small light hanging overhead.

_What are they waiting for, is it a crime scene, a meetup?_

She heard a familiar click pointed right behind her head. “Don't move,” a stern, silky smooth voice came. Morrigan did the opposite, she spun around with her hands raised. It was Marco Walker! Was that what they were waiting for? Well, duh. “I just said don't move!” He shouted.

“I thought that usually meant to not move _towards you,_ ” Morrigan said. Marco glared at her, his gun not faltering. Not to be that person, but man, this man was fine. Even The Calamity herself- an entity who had destroyed millions of worlds and billions of living things- could admit this fact. Just, whew, what's with con-men being so fine? _Wait that's how they able to scam people so easily_. Morrigan just gave her staple wide cocky smile, Marco gave her a strange look.

“Morrigan?!” Luke cried. The two agents had finally noticed the commotion and were running at them guns a blazing. Before Morrigan could react Marco grabbed her and pushed the gun up to her head. Nimah and Luke stopped dead in their tracks.

“Come any closer and she dies!” Marco yelled. “I said no backup!”

“She's not backup, she's just a civilian!” Nimah said, her thick Texan accent as stern as her gun trained on Marco.

“Actually, I'm Japanese.” Morrigan raised a finger in correction only to be greeted with three ‘shut ups!’ Morrigan closed her mouth and lowered her finger.

“Just put the gun down and we can talk,” Luke warned.

“No! No,” Marco said, his eyes darted between the two agents. “You won't listen to me without it. I'm keeping it.”

“Marco…” Nimah warned.

“Polo!” Morrigan interjected.

“Shut up!” Three voices yelled at her again. Morrigan barely suppressed a smile.

“Please, no one will listen to me...” Marco pleaded. “No one will listen to me, I never killed that family! That's not my style! I've been telling you there were partners!”

“I personally checked out these ‘partners’ myself three years ago, Walker,” Luke said, inching ever so slightly closer. “They're made up, just like your entire story,” Luke said.

It was too late for Morrigan. The gears were turning in her head, her facial expression going lax. “I don't know, Luke… I have a funny feeling…” Morrigan said. Luke gave her a glare that could be universally translated to ‘shut up.’

“You didn't listen to me three years ago, Agent Miller,” Marco started to inch for the exit. “...But I bet you're listening now,”

Before anyone could get another word in Marco raised his gun up to the lamp above their heads and shot it out in a pop. It went dark and there was a lot of shuffling, yelling and Morrigan being dragged away. Morrigan felt the gun dig into her back and push her forward. Marco dragged Morrigan to a car parked right outside and was pushed in. By the time Luke and Nimah got out Marco was speeding away, with Morrigan as his hostage.

“Morrigan!” Luke yelled. He ran a hand through his hair. “Now we've lost a dangerous fugitive AND he has a hostage.” He turned to an equally distraught Nimah. “This is bad.”

  
________________________

Morrigan drummed her fingers against the old pickup trucks cupholder. She absently watched as they sped down the road and blurring by trees. They had only been driving for a few minutes but Morrigan was already getting antsy. She started to tap her foot to the beat of the song she was singing in her head.

“Can you stop that?!” Marco snapped. All tapping stopped. “What's wrong with you!?”

“Sorry, I've just had four cans of Red Bull, I’m a little energized,” Morrigan said back. “You ever had Dayquil mixed with Five Hour Energy mixed with Red Bull?” She asked. Marco snapped his head towards her.

“No. Sounds like it would kill you.”

“Surprisingly no, all it really does is make you feel like you could run around the earth twelve times and makes you walk into a potentially life-threatening scenario with a fugitive,” She replied, still looking out the window. Marco scoffed.

“You seem awfully calm for someone who was just kidnapped at gunpoint,” Marco said. He still had his gun but was no longer pointing it at her. Morrigan pushed her hair back behind her shoulder.

“You get used to it. It happens a lot when you run into dangerous situations blindly,” Morrigan said flatly. “Plus, I think the Five Hour-Day-Bull is messing with my ability to feel emotions.”

A few minutes passed with complete silence before Marco pulled over into a bumpy side road and stopped out of sight from the main road. Morrigan pursed her lips, hoping that a secluded location didn’t mean what Morrigan thought it meant. She took a quick glance down at the gun and narrowed her eyes.

Marco parked the car and dropped the gun into his lap. “Listen you've got to help me, I need to clear my name of the murders,” Marco said to her. Well, that certainly wasn't killing her. Morrigan felt disappointed, almost.

But honestly, she can't say she wasn't expecting this. She thought back to the parking garage. When talking to Luke he sounded frantic, and desperate. Probably not lying about being innocent. Plus Morrigan had seen it a hundred times in crime shows. The guilty always run, the innocent stay to clear their name.

Morrigan smiled at Marco. “Well… This certainly is a change of events!”

Marco looked at Morrigan's cheerful grin weird. For the first time, he took a good look at his hostage. She certainly was gorgeous. Long dark red hair, dark skin with a blue tint to it, sharp cheekbones, freckles, and golden eyes. She had a cool aura to her. She had said she was Japanese, right? She also looked very VERY tired.

“You're that forensic anthropologist from the news right? Morrigan Star, the one that helped solve lots of cases? Like ones the F.B.I won't bother with?” He said cautiously.

“Well… They usually involve bones...”

“You solved the Raymond case! That was a bank robbery!”

“Yes, it also involved my boyfriend so it was kinda obligation. He was a hostage.” Morrigan said, maybe a little too proudly as she thought back to the time she weaved her way into working with a bank robber (despite said robber threatening Yin with a gun).

“Agent Miller?! Oh God, have I kidnapped Agent Miller's girlfriend?!” Marco said in horror.

“What no? Why does everyone think we’re dating?” Morrigan said. “Anyway, that’s not the point. If I told you I was never on T.V and that you're hallucinating would you let me go?”

Marco frowned. “We have T.V in prison, you know. I know it's you.”

“I have a question about that actually, do they let you watch shows like ‘ _Prison Break_ ’ and ‘ _Breakout Kings_ ’ or do they think that it would give you guys ideas and they block it?” Morrigan asked. Marco frowned again.

“I know that you're her, I need your help. You have to prove I'm not guilty.”

“Oh that's easy, Your legal name is Marco Walker, right? Not, Guilty.” Morrigan said starting to tap her foot again and gave a sly smile. Marco cocked his gun and Morrigan raised her hands in surrender.

“No! Of the murders! I didn't do that! It had to be my partners! I just don't know why!” He said back, already annoyed with Morrigan's antics. Morrigan's eyes widened. She gave it some thought.

“What if I say no?” She asked, humoring the thought.

“Then I'll kill you,” Marco said back to her, gun still pointed on her. Morrigan perked up.

“Then ok! I'll help clear your name. But, you have to tell me everything you know, can't work with nothing, you know,” Morrigan said. Marco almost looked relieved and he lowered the gun. “And buy me at least nine bottles caffeinated drinks and four packs of gummy candy. Preferably sour. I need to stay awake if I'm going to be solving a case,” She added.

“Nine drinks!? Four bags of candy?!” Marco said. “Why would you need all that stuff?”

“You can get more done if you stay up all night, do you know how long twenty-four hours really is? I’ve been getting so much done!”

With everything Marco had seen from this woman in the past fifteen minutes, he couldn't tell if she was joking or not. Still, he complied. “Fine, there's a gas station a few miles up. I can tell you everything on the way there.” Marco said starting the car back up and pulling out of the back road and they kept driving the way they were originally going.

“Do I also get one phone call?” Morrigan asked.

“That's for if you're arrested,” Marco replied, eyes still on the road.

“Well...” Morrigan started but Marco cut her off before she could add another joke.

“Everyone knows I was a thief. It was common knowledge that I was the best-”

“Were you really, though? I feel like every thief says they’re the best, I mean you did get caught in the end—“

“Will you shut up so I can tell you this?” Marco snapped. Morrigan closed her mouth and nodded. Marco took a deep breath and continued. “Your F.B.I friends had been chasing me for years. I had stolen millions of dollars, only to have them taken from me when those murders were pinned on me,” Marco explained, keeping his eyes straight ahead at the road. “Anyway, I get into business with these guys, thugs. They were messy, breaking into places and smashing. Not particularly my style but it was a job that let me stay in one place for-”

“Wait, back up- Who are these ‘guys,” Morrigan asked.

“I just said, they were local thugs. I didn't learn their real names, I only knew they went by Lefty and Jon. We had a good gig running- They had a good gig running. I guess I was always kinda the outsider. Then one day the guys came up to me telling me that they had scored the ‘big one.’” Marco gripped the steering wheel. “They had caught wind that there was a shipment of a million coming in. They said it was just going to be a hit and run, grab the merch and get out,”

“Simple as that!”

“Simple as that,” Marco agreed. “We did the standard, break-in at night and grab as much as possible. So, I’m in another room all alone pulling gems into a sack when I heard two gunshots ring out in the next room! I run in and the mom and pop are just on the floor shot! I stood over them to see if the poor couple was alive but before I could do anything was hit over the head and next thing I know I'm being thrown in jail for their murders!” Marco finished and took a deep breath. Morrigan took a moment to process all the information she had gathered.

“You told the police all this?” Morrigan asked.

“You think I didn’t?! Your little F.B.I friend, Agent Miller, never believed me! They raised the daughter up as the brave hero and didn't even follow up on my tips!”

“So your partners bailed on you?”

“Yeah, I guess they did. Lefty's still around I know that, but Jon, I haven't heard a word from him since that night.” Marco said through gritted teeth.

Morrigan thought for a second. Everything inside of her was telling her that he was telling the truth, con-man or not. “Can I get that one phone call now? I promise I won't order Chinese this time, I just want to see if I can convince Luke to re-check these guys out,”

Marco faltered for a second and reluctantly handed Morrigan his burner phone. “Try to call for help and I'll shoot you,” then under his breath, “Won't order Chinese, _this time_?”

“Will do partner!” Morrigan said, punching in Luke's phone number and placing it to her ear.

“Miller-” Luke's worried voice came from on the other line.

“Hey, Luke! I think we need to take a closer look at the suspect pool-” Morrigan started but was cut off by Luke's frantic shouting.

“Morrigan!? Are you ok!? Where are you, how are you contacting me!?” Luke shot a million questions Morrigan's way.

“Well, I'm in the car and he's got a gun but can you check out the names Lefty and Jon? I'm telling you, I think there's some truth to Marco’s story,” Morrigan said. She started twirling her hair on her finger casually.

“Morrigan, I need you to tell me where you are,” Luke said.

“Aw, listen to you, you’re really worried about me,” Morrigan ignored Luke. “Marco has relayed to me what happened the night of the murder and, I think he’s telling the truth. It makes sense, how would he be able to rob the store AND kill the parents?? It just doesn’t add up, there had to be partners!”

“Don't call him by his first name, Morrigan!” Luke shot back to her with worried annoyance. “We already checked that out years ago, there was nothing. He made up the partners to throw us off! I need you to do something for me. If you're ok say, OK. If not say-”

“Relax, Luke. This isn't _Collateral_.” Morrigan said cutting Luke off. “I may be a hostage but we’re not going from house to house killing people,” Morrigan drawled sarcastically.

“I've never seen that movie, Morrigan,” Luke said sharply.

“Oh! It's a movie about a cab driver who finds himself the hostage of an engaging contract killer as he makes his rounds from hit to hit during one night in Los Angeles. Tom Cruise was the- Hey!” Morrigan didn't get to finish talking about the movie because Marco grabbed the burner and clapped it shut. Morrigan pouted. “It's a good movie…”

“I don't need you discussing movies right now,” Marco grumbled. They pulled into an empty parking lot of a gas station and Marco parked at one of the pumps. He opened the door and jumped out.

“I'll be back, don't even think about running. If you do I'll shoot the cashier.” He said grabbing the gun.

“You know for a guy who wants to prove he didn't kill anyone you sure do threaten murder a lot.”

“I've got nothing to lose, you're my last resort. If it doesn't work out then nothing matters anymore,” He replied before closing the door and jogging into the store. Morrigan immediately pulled out her phone from her bra and texted Luke.

_“Any way it starred Tom Cruise and Jamie Foxx you should watch it I think it was good O and also follw Up on Lefty an jon”_

Luke replied almost instantly.

_“Morrigan? Where are you? How are you contacting me this time?”_

_“He didnt even chcek to see if i had a phone on meDid he even read the kiddnapinhg hand book? Worst kidnapper ever! Oh also anothgrtr good hostage movie is Die Hard, best cop movie evr!!”_

“Who are you texting?!” Marco demaded, opening the truck's door, plastic bag in hand. Morrigan sent one last lest before Marco snatched her phone away from her.

_“Gtg luke lol”_

Marco then read the text she sent and seeing another response from Luke pop up.

“How do you turn this thing off?” Marco said tapping everywhere on the phone. Morrigan snatched it back and held down the power button and slid it off.

“Like that.” She said and innocently handed the phone back to him. Marco scowled and put the phone in his front pocket. He then gave the plastic bag filled with sugar to Morrigan.

“You better not have tipped them off to where we are or I’ll- ” He started before Morrigan cut him off.

“Yeah, You'll summon the four horsemen of the apocalypse and everyone dies. I heard you the first time.” Morrigan said, playing with her fingernails.

“I don't think you're taking this seriously,” Marco said. “How have you not been shot already?”

“Oh, I have! Three times! Actually, the first case I worked with Luke I was shot! Provoking a man with a gun.”

“Like you’re doing now?”

“Well, I know you won't kill me so I have no reason to be afraid. In fact, I could just leave right now and you wouldn't do anything.” Morrigan said.

“So why haven't you?” He asked starting up the car.

“Because I said I would help you. So I am. I can never resist a good mystery.” Morrigan said pulling out a coffee and opening it, taking a big swing of it. She tore open a bag of gummy worms and put a few in her mouth. Marco shook his head.

“Thanks,” He said under his breath and he pulled out of the parking lot.

“So, where are we off to next?” Morrigan asked, chewing on a gummy worm.

“An old establishment,” Marco replied.

  
________________________

  
Luke let out a frustrated groan looking at Morrigan's typo-ridden texts. He had sent Morrigan a few more texts but she never answered. Her phone was probably taken away. The others around him sighed as well, knowing full well that there was no such luck.

“What’d she say?” Nimah asked.

“She's talking about _Die Hard_ and- and _Collateral_! She's still making movie references when kidnapped by a dangerous criminal!” Luke said in disbelief. “And I don't even know what this last one means, _‘GTG Luke LOL,”_

“It means _‘Got to go, Luke. Laughing out loud.’”_ Nora said.

“Great, she gets kidnapped by a dangerous killer and she's not even taking it seriously.” He said, rubbing his forehead. He hoped that wasn't going to be the last thing she ever said to him. “This is all my fault, I can't believe I didn't notice her following us…”

“If it makes you feel better, I didn't notice either,” Nimah said.

“No, it really doesn't make me feel better,” Luke said. “Where did she even learn all this stuff? She's a forensic anthropologist! She has no business doing these things!”

“Her father was a cop,” Nora said. “She probably gets it from him.”

Luke fell dramatically on a nearby chair and ran a hand through his hair. “I don't want to think about it right now. I just want to fix this…”

“It's not your fault, Mil,” Nora said. “Morrigan shouldn't have been tailing you in the first place. If anything it's her fault.”

“I knew she would do this! I just knew it!” Luke hissed. “I thought maybe if I just acted normal she wouldn't notice the high profile case, and maybe I wouldn't have to deal with… this!” Luke waved his hand in front of him where the board of information stood, newly added with _‘HOSTAGE: DR. MORRIGAN STAR.’_

“We should at least try to find out more about these guys Morrigan mentioned,” Nora said. “She might be right, Walker could be innocent of the murders.”

“Or, Walker kidnapped Morrigan and is using her as a diversion to get away. We ran this case to its last string three years ago! We can't find these people because they don't exist!” Luke said back to her.

“Luke, you need to relax some, look at this from Morrigan's perspective. I'm sure she only wanted to help Walker. She does have an odd talent of solving cold cases…” Nimah said.

“Yeah! And she has an “odd” talent of getting shot because she sticks her nose where it doesn't belong! She shouldn't even be working cases outside of her field!” Luke waved his arms around frantically.

“There’s nothing more we can do, the best option is trying to follow up on the partners again,” Nora shrugged. “Hey, maybe three years left on the back burner did this case some good,”

“We won’t find anything because they don’t exist!” Luke shrilled. He took a deep breath and calmed himself. “Walker is just dragging her along as a cover story and as soon as he doesn’t need her anymore, she's going to be shot and left in some abandoned warehouse.”

“It’s the best we can do, Luke.” Nimah said, placing a hand on Luke's shoulder. It was the best they could do, he could only hope Morrigan would get out of this in one piece.

  
________________________

  
The ‘old establishment’ definitely looked old. It was a lone strip club out in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the Minnesota forests. Morrigan thought if it wasn't for the extremely bright neon sign, absolutely no one would have noticed it.

Marco pulled the blue pickup to a stop in the dirt parking lot, parking next to one of the four cars currently stationed at the club. Morrigan jumped out along with Marco and examined the clubs name.

The Slutty Cage. Who came up with that name? It definitely wasn't as sexy as a strip clubs name should be. Morrigan followed Marco through the heavy green doors and into the club. Instinctively, Morrigan began to commit everything in the room to her memory.

Seven people. One bartender, three strippers and three customers. Immediately to her right was the bar.

The bartender was an older man with a classy look. Morrigan did a quick scan of the three strippers, a slender woman with fluffy blonde hair, an Asian woman with long black hair and a black woman who had her hair in twin braids. The blonde was giving a lap dance, the Asian woman looked boredーsitting up against one of the polls on her phoneーand the black woman was chatting with what looked like two customers. There was a backroom on the far left.

Marco went and sat at the bar, Morrigan followed suit, shoving what she saw to the back of her memory.

“Well, nice to see you again,” The bartender said, raising an eyebrow at Marco.

“You too, Tara,” Marco raised a hand in greeting.

“The usual?” Tara asked. Marco nodded. _Ah, a regular._ Tara turned to Morrigan. “And for the lady?”

“Anything with caffeine,” Morrigan said vaguely.

Marco scanned the room before his eyes fell on the blonde woman. “Candy!” He shouted. The woman looked up and her eyes went wide and she squealed. She bounced over in her bright pink bikini and clear stiletto heels.

“Marco Walker, I'd didn't think you would actually come back here,” She said slyly, wrapping her arms around Marco. “Figured if you broke out you'd run and never look back.”

“Aw, you know I could never leave you guys,” Marco said. Candy turned to look at the gorgeous woman sitting next to him.

“Whos this?”

Before Marco could say anything Morrigan interjected her own introduction. “Morrigan Star, Forensic Anthropologist, detective and dog-whisperer on the side. I'd like to know if this is a Dusk Till Dawn situation and this club is entirely populated with vampires,”

Marco glared at her and opened his mouth to say something but Candy laughed.

“Oh, she's a keeper!” She giggled. Up close Morrigan could really examine her, she had freckles and deep green eyes; her skin was a very silky white. Tara came up and placed their drinks down. “But seriously,” Candy said. “What are you doing here? You're all over the news.”

“I’m on the news? Oh great!” Marco said rubbing his forehead. The purple neon lights reflected all around them giving Morrigan and Marco's dark skin a purple glow. Marco sighed. “I heard that you guys are going to be shut down,”

Candy sighed and put a hand on Marco’s shoulder. “Oh, Marco… It was bound to happen eventually… I'm sure we'll be able to find work elsewhere,”

“The club is shutting down? Is that why you broke out?” Morrigan asked.

Marco paused for a beat. “Yes,” 

“Did you plan on saving it? How? Starting an idol group to gain attention?” Morrigan waved her hand in a vague motion to add to her point.

Marco growled and ignored Morrigan, focusing his attention on Candy.

“If only I could have got out during the jewel heist… I could've given you the money… But someone skipped town with our last hope,”

Morrigan sat in her chair silently. She took a sip of her drink while watching the exchange. Yep, this drink was definitely caffeinated. She started to fiddle with some pen and paper around her, letting the two talk. She sighed. The room had gained a melancholy energy, Marco really cared about this club and the people in it.

“Why would you care so much about some random club? In such a weird location too, it's like something you find in an indie movie.” Morrigan said looking around the place. Purple and neon lights were a recurring theme Morrigan had noticed.

“It's not random!” Marco snapped. He took a deep breath and composed himself. “I heard the news of the club being shut down I had to get out and clear my name, I needed some way to save the club from going under. I practically lived in this club. It was a place I could go when I was winding down from a job or…” Marco trailed off.

“Wait you're out to clear your name as well?” Candy asked looking surprised. “I knew it! We all knew you would never kill someone we just weren't able to do anything about it, I'm sorry.” Candy said giving an apologetic smile.

“I'm glad you didn’t come forward with some story, the bar would have been instantly shut down. I wouldn't want that.” Marco said sighing. “You didn't have any guys sniffing around here in the years I was gone, did you?”

“Guys?” Candy asked, a confused look played on her face.

“Two of them. Lefty, a tall guy with tattoos down his neck, and Jon, he had piercings all over: most notably one that went directly through the bone of his nose. He also had a huge scar on his left arm after it was almost cut off from crawling under a car to escape the police.” Marco said. “Anything like that?”

“Damn, these guys sound hardcore…” Morrigan thought out loud. Marco shook his head and waved her off as Candy thought for a moment.

“Uh, no. Sorry, doll. All the faces tend to blend together here,” Candy said apologetically.

“That's alright, thanks for trying…” Marco smiled.

“You think they are the ones who framed you for the murders?” Morrigan asked.

“Who else is there?” Marco said. Morrigan shrugged, there really wasn't a suspect pool anyway.

“Any place they resided? A nice hotel, summer home, a spa house perhaps?” Morrigan asked.

“There's an old warehouse a few miles up. The night of the robbery we were told to meet back there.” Marco replied. “Bye, Candy. It's been great seeing you again.” Marco gave Candy a quick hug. Morrigan gave her a wink and gave her something and whispered something in her ear. Candy gave a confused look but nodded. With that last interaction, the two were off.

“What did you say to her? I hope it wasn't an S.O.S message, because if it was then I'm going to-” Marco started but Morrigan cut him off.

“Relax, it was just something to make the feds even angrier at me.” She replied, smiling coyly.

  
________________________

  
Luke and Nimah stepped out of the black van and into the parking lot where Morrigan and Walker were last seen. The cashier had seen their news report and called in that he had a run-in with Walker. Luke and Nimah reached the cashier in the run-down gas station who called in the tip.

“I'm Luke Miller and this is my associate, Nimah Rose,” Luke introduced. “We want to ask you a few questions.” He said and both held up their badges for identification.

“Oh, God! Thank God you made it! About that guy?” The cashier asked, wringing his hands. “The one on the news that I called in?”

“Yes, when did he come in?” Nimah asked, taking out her notepad to scribble notes on.

“Um, like thirty minutes ago. He just, like, came in alone and, like, started grabbing things off the shelf, he came over here and gave me more money than I asked for and dashed out.” The cashier wiped at his nose.

“Did you see what his car looked like? Was there anyone in it?” Luke asked.

“Uh, a blue pickup truck. I think. Maybe I saw someone in it?” The cashier replied rubbing his temple. “I mean, I don't know. It all became really cloudy when I realized he was a dangerous criminal! Are you guys, like, gonna get him?”

“Did you see where they went?” Nimah asked.

“No, well, I mean there's a strip club a few miles up. Maybe there? I don't know,” The cashier said.

“Thanks anyway,” Luke replied turning to walk away.

“Wait!” The cashier called out. “What if he, like, comes back! What if I get killed! I, like, saw his face and stuff!”

Luke rolled his eyes. “He's not going to come back, but in case he does, we’re going to have an officer positioned out front,” Luke reassured. The cashier didn't look any less frazzled.

“But what if-”

Luke cut him off. “We've really got to be going, you're not going to die.” Luke sighed and walked quickly out the doors before the cashier could ask any more questions.

Both the agents jumped into the van, getting ready to chase the next lead to where Morrigan and Walker had gone.

“I just hope Morrigan's still there,” Luke murmured. Nimah shook her head.

“Honestly, I doubt it. She’s probably gone by now. If she really wanted to send us clues to where they were she would've done so already.” Nimah said. Luke sighed as he pulled out of the parking lot.

“I'm glad she's on our side. If she was a criminal I don't think we would ever be able to catch her…” Luke sighed. “She could at least try and not get kidnapped as often. Four times in the past four months! She averages about one kidnapping a month!”

“I think it's five?” Nimah said tapping her chin.

Luke deflated and suppressed an urge to scream. “I forgot about the catnapping case..” Luke started up the car and peeled out of the dry parking lot.

The ride was quiet from then on out. They didn't miss the strip club, the neon lights really gave it away. They got out and a chilly wind blew, another cold front rolling in. Luke squinted his eyes at the name of the club. The Slutty Cage, what a dumb name.

They both walked into the club and were immediately greeted with a surplus of purple neon lights. There weren't too many people here. Just some bored strippers and a bartender. One of the strippers noticed them come in and perked up, she got up from her chair and shyly walked over to them.

“Um, excuse me?” She asked, her fluffy blonde hair dipping with her when she cocked her head to the side. “Are you Luke Miller?”

Luke was taken aback at the sudden question. “Yeah I am, how did you know?”

“I think this is for you.” She said and handed him a note. It was addressed to one Luke Miller (Blonde guy in a suit).

“Morrigan,” He growled, but still read the note.

_I'm sure of it now Marco is innocent of the murders, I would make another hostage movie reference but I can only think of Speed (1994) not sure how that ties in_

Luke’s eye twitched let out a frustrated groan. Dammit, Morrigan. Why did she always do stuff like this? He then looked down at the rest of the note.

_Turn this over._

He did and read what other text was on the other side.

_If you want to take statements from everyone you forgot your pen in the van._

Luke's eyes shot down to his front pocket where he usually kept his pen. It wasn't there. He whirled around and looked around the room wide-eyed before stomping back out to the van and grabbing his pen from the cup holder. He went back inside and walked back up to the blonde woman.

“So, um…” Luke started, hoping the woman would tell him her name.

“Candy.”

“You have a real name?” Luke sighed not looking up from clicking his pen open and turning his small notebook to a clean page, he had been through this motion way too many times. Candy sighed.

“Candice Jamie,” She said reluctantly.

“Ok. Candice. There was a man who came in with the woman who gave you this note, what was he like?” Luke asked getting ready to write stuff down.

“Um, normal. They got drinks and left. She stopped by me before leaving, gave me this note and said ‘Give it to the blonde F.B.I agent when he walks in here’.” Candy said vaguely.

“Were they here looking for ‘guys?’” Luke asked.

“Uh- I… I don't know, sorry, doll. I'm just an employee..” Candy stuttered out. She didn't want to rat her longtime friend out, and Morrigan had told her to keep Luke in the dark for now. She hoped that Morrigan would somehow be able to fix the situation. Everyone wanted Marco to be cleared. After a few more dead-end questions Luke and Nimah thanked her and they eventually left. They were still nowhere closer to finding Morrigan.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan was trapped into yet another silent, boring car ride. She sighed impatiently and watched the gray storm clouds roll in. Every now and then she would shift her focus to the car's mirrors and catch a glimpse of the red pickup crawling down the freeway behind them. Morrigan had started reciting the numbers of pi in her head and was slowly descending into madness while doing it.

“Top three cop movies, go,” She spontaneously spoke up. Marco turned his head to her with a confused look.

“What?”

“Wrong. It's: _Die Hard, Die Hard 2, Die Hard 3_ ,” Morrigan said.

“Why are you saying this?” Marco asked, his eyebrows scrunched up. Morrigan sighed.

“It's something I do with Luke or my friends, Top Best Blank,” Morrigan said. Marco just shook his head. Morrigan pouted. “Oo! How bout’ top three best thief movies of all time?” Morrigan said excitedly, sitting up and turning towards Marco. “Some good ones I can think of are _Heat, Catch Me If You Can and Reservoir Dogs!_ ”

“Shut up,” Marco grumbled. “I'll shoot you.”

Morrigan sighed and fell back into her seat. “You're sounding more and more like Luke with the passing minutes...”

Marco ignored her as he pulled off into a dirt road, leading up to what looked like a vine-covered warehouse.

Everything about the place was faded, from the bricks of the building to the faded parking spot paint that Marco pulled the pickup into lazily. The truck was switched off and immediately the air was filled with even deadlier silence.

Marco clicked open the door and jumped out, Morrigan followed. Marco paused and looked at her. “Listen I just need to look around for a bit… Just stay outta my way, or outside.” Marco turned and started advancing to the warehouse. Morrigan quickly bounced after him.

“But we haven't finished our discussion about movies yet! You didn't even tell me what your favorite thief movie is!” Morrigan pouted. “If you want me to solve your case you have to tell me everything, remember?”

“Even my favorite thief movie?” Marco sighed, stopping at the chained doors of the building. He took out a pin and began to pick the lock. “I don't see how it's related to me being arrested for murders I did not commit.”

“You don't know! It could be important. Plus I feel like we're becoming friends. Friends tell each other their favorite movies and gossip about people at work!” Morrigan said.

Marco ignored her and unlocked the heavy lock to the warehouse. He pulled off the chains and creaked open the door. “ _Inception_ ,” Marco said, before walking in. “I liked the visuals.”

“Oh! I knew you had one! Every thief has a thief movie!” Morrigan said. Marco grunted and pushed into the warehouse.

Morrigan trailed in slowly behind Marco, slowly looking at everything around her. Morrigan saw a few rusty shipping containers. Those had not been used for a long time. Morrigan stopped in the middle of the room and took a deep breath, feeling the dust particles grate her lungs. To the end, there was a shipping dock. Not much of anything, like Marco said. Marco was shuffling around some of the boxes towards the back, kicking the over and opening them up.

“So this is your secret spy hideout…” Morrigan said. “I expected something a little more…” Morrigan paused and scruffed her shoe over an old tar stain. “...Nice.”

“It's not like we were living here, we just needed a good place to hide from the feds,” Marco grumbled. “You're really annoying, you know that right?”

“I've been told…” Morrigan trailed off. Her eyes kept darting around the area. She couldn't shake a feeling in her gut that something was terribly wrong. “It seems like a pretty good place to hide, in all the years that you were operating the feds never did found this place… Has it always been abandoned?”

Marco stood up from the boxes and went over to one of the empty offices positioned in the corners. “Hell if I know. I didn't ask any questions as long as I was paid.”

“You should’ve, I ask questions all the time to people. Even people who kidnap me!” Morrigan said.

Marco opened the office door and went in, leaving Morrigan out in the open alone. “You should learn to keep your mouth shut sometimes!” He called out.

Morrigan sighed and looked out into one over the high up, dusty windows. “What were Lefty and Jon like? Did they have any quirks?”

“They were thugs. Lefty was a bastard and Jon was a greedy bastard,” Marco said simply. Morrigan frowned. Of course, a con-man would say as little as possible.

“What are you looking for?” Morrigan called out.

“Evidence,” Marco replied.

“Of what? Seriously, this place hasn’t been used in years.” Morrigan said, running a finger across a crate grey from dust. There was a clean path left on the brown crate, and she was left with a grey fingertip.

“Go wait out front,” Marco called back.

Morrigan ignored him and spun around the room again, looking at everything she could. After a 360, Morrigan's eyes fell onto a part of the wall that caught her eye. It stood as a different color than the rest, as if it had been installed just a few years ago. Morrigan sauntered over to it and knocked on it. Sounds hollow… If there was anything inside she couldn't tell. Morrigan pressed her head up against the wall, her hair pushing up with her. She knocked once more trying to use a very bad version of echolocation to see if anything was inside. Morrigan squinted her eyes and knocked again, listening intently to the echo. She knocked again, silence followed. Maybe this wasn't the best idea. Morrigan raised her knuckles again to knock but was interrupted by an all too familiar click.

 _“Uh oh.”_ Was Morrigan's last thought as a bullet slammed straight into her temple, splattering blood everywhere behind her.

The Calamity fell to her knees and clawed at her exploded head. Static screamed in her ears and inky black darkness engulfed her. The colors of different realities started to swing around the room, clawing at the walls. The world began to glitch, the fabric of the universe realizing what was happening. All of it lasted for a millisecond before slamming back into Morrigan.

Marco ran back in just as Morrigan was able to shake her head and grasp her surroundings. Marco grabbed her arm to pull her to her feet; Morrigan felt him pause, but ultimately he pulled her up and dragged her away. Morrigan's vision was blurry and she could hear the faint sound of screaming but was unable to make sense of anything that was happening.

They burst out into the sunlight and Morrigan finally heard “Are you ok?!” shouted from Marco. Morrigan nodded, only hoping all the blood had disintegrated and she had repaired her body adequately. Morrigan got a good look at who had shot her right before he pulled away.

 _Well, I'll be it, it was Lefty._ He sped away in a red pickup truck--Wait? Wasn't that the same pickup truck that she saw in the mirror? Morrigan mentally kicked herself for not picking up on the fact they were being followed.

“You can get out of here through the woods!” Marco yelled as they reached the car. “He only wants me- Hey! Wha-” Marco looked at Morrigan with bewilderment as she jumped into the passenger seat beside him. Marco tried to protest but another shot rang out from Lefty in his own car, who was speeding back towards the two, forcing Marco to peel out of the way. Lefty tried to make his escape, peeling out of the lot and onto the road. Marco followed, close on his tail.

Marco tried his best to keep close to the two in the car while avoiding the bullets Lefty was shooting at them from the window. Morrigan gasped.

“I guess this is how _Speed_ ties into this whole situation!”

“This isn't a time for jokes!” Marco yelled, swerving over into the other lane to dodge another bullet.

“What are you going to do if you actually catch him?” Morrigan asked. “You don't have any bullets, you used the last one in the parking garage on the light,” She pointed out.

Marco slammed the car down from its sixty miles per hour to a twenty. “Which is exactly why you need to get out.”

“What?” Morrigan asked, confused. “I've been a great hostage! Why are you getting rid of me?”

“I can't let you get hurt. This is my fight now,” Marco said sadly. He reached over to Morrigan's door and swung it open

“Wait!” Morrigan yelled. “Just promise you'll keep your burner in your front pocket at all times!”

Marco gave her a confused look. Before Morrigan could protest anymore, Marco had pushed her out.

She landed unceremoniously on her back onto the hot asphalt, rolling a bit before coming to a stop on her side. She heard the tires of the pickup squeal away, leaving Morrigan lying on the edge of the road. She lay there for a few more seconds, watching the pickup speed away. It wasn't until they were out of sight that she decided to push herself off the ground.

She groaned and sat up with a yawn. She stood up and looked at the damage done to her body, nothing too bad. Just some scratches, bruises, and cuts. Morrigan frowned at the small cuts, knowing she wouldn’t be able to heal them as easy. She sighed and pushed herself to her feet, turning the opposite way from where the trucks drove to, there was only one thing she could do. Walk back to the warehouse, of course!

Morrigan began to stumble forward and make her way back down the road, a deep grey storm forming itself over the horizon of the Minnesota forest.

“Me too, buddy,” Morrigan grumbled in response to the storm swirling and crashing. Her eyes widened and she froze dead in her tracks.

“DAMMIT!” She screamed. “He still has all my gummy snacks....”

  
________________________

  
“Again, we’re so sorry to call you in on such short notice, Mrs. Jewel,” Luke said, guiding the long, red-haired woman into one of the F.B.I interrogation rooms. She clutched her Prada handbag so hard that her pale knuckles turned paperwhite. Her red stiletto heels clipped over to one of the chairs at the table.

“No! It's ok, I'm just sorry this psycho is back out in the open again!” Rosie Jewel cried as she pulled out one of the chairs and sat down. She crossed her legs and leaned forward. “I'll do anything to help get this crazy man back behind bars!”

Luke smiled and sat down in front of her. “I know this is hard for you, but we need to trace your steps again the night of the murders,” Rosie's perfectly makeuped eye twitched.

“Is that really necessary, Officer? I mean, I already told you everything three years ago,” Rosie flipped her hair over her shoulder to show off her off the shoulder green dress.

“Agent,” Luke corrected. “We need to chase any lead possible, even three-year-old ones.”

Rosie sighed and dropped her shoulders. “As I said before, we had a late shipment in and I was upstairs when I heard the door being smashed, then two shots rang out. I ran downstairs to see that man standing over my parents’ bodies.” Rosie said, spitting the word ‘man’ out. “I grabbed a nearby vase and smashed him over the head with it.”

“And you're absolutely sure there were no partners?” Luke asked. “No signs that someone else could've been there?”

“Yes,” Rosie said firmly. “It was only him,”

“What was the shipment?” Luke asked.

Rosie stiffened. “I don't remember. It was so long ago, I've forgotten at this point.”

Luke sighed, nothing as expected. He looked Rosie over as she tapped her long fingernails over the metal desk, making a clicking sound that infected your brain. She had certainly grown in the years following her parents’ death. She got hundreds of thousands in television appearances and a payout of a million. She certainly was spending it graciously, her whole outfit (makeup included) had to cost about a thousand dollars.

“You certainly are doing really well for yourself,” Luke said. Rosie nodded eagerly, smiling to show off her pearly white teeth.

“I run the business in my parents’ honor and people are very kind when it comes to spending at my- our shop,” Rosie said proudly. “I'm in charge of everything now, my own business!”

Luke smiled at her passion. It immediately dropped when he realized he was still nowhere closer to finding the ‘guys’ or Walker and Morrigan. He let out a breath. “I’m sorry to just bring you in to ask you the same questions again, but we really need some help. Anything, anything at all could help us. Do you remember having any unsavory characters hanging out around your shop?”

“No,” Rosie said firmly. “We never had any problems.”

“Are you sure?” Luke asked, resisting the urge to rub his eyes and pull out his hair.

“Yes,” Rosie said again. “I really can't think of any more, Luke. But maybe after a nice dinner, I could remember something…”

“Alright, we’ll have an officer escort you home.” Luke sighed, looking off into space at this point.

“Why not you?” Rosie said, smiling sweetly at Luke. Luke smiled back and motioned that Rosie could leave.

“I'm not an officer.” Luke sighed. Rosie pouted as he guided her out of the interrogation room. He watched her go down the elevator with an officer. That entire ordeal was a waste of time. Once Rosie was gone, Luke fell down into the interrogation room chair and ran a hand through his hair.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan had made her way back to the warehouse just fine, just as the sun began to set and cast its orange light over the world. Morrigan stood in front of the wall again, examining a bullet hole with a small bit of blood staining it. _Damn_ , she hoped Marco didn’t catch that.

Morrigan held a rusty crowbar in her hands, she was going to find out what was behind this wall. Whatever it was it made her blood pressure spike in excitement. She raised the crowbar up, her hands tightly around the rusted metal that grated her skin, and drove it into the wall with her full force. The plaster crumbled beneath her touch like rice cakes. Inside wasn’t a chest of gold that the thief crew stole like Morrigan was hoping.

Inside lay a skeleton decomposed and twisted. A rotten, browning skull smiled back at her. It was leaning against the back wall, standing up. Clothed in blue-jean from head to toe. Morrigan couldn't help but blink in surprise.

“Who thinks blue jean everything is a good idea?” Morrigan said, shaking off her initial shock. She stepped forward and reached out a long slender finger and ran it down the side of the mandible of the skull. “Where have you been, beautiful?”

She chuckled in the dimming light, admiring the perfect skeleton shoved in the pocket in front of her. It’s sunken eyes stared back at her blankly. Morrigan took a step back to admire it from afar. The sunlight from the windows cast an orange glow on it, highlighting the twisted skin and illuminating the pocket. A small refracted light on the wall behind the skeleton pulled her attention away,

Morrigan walked back over in wonder and peeked her head into the wall. There was something on the bottom of the floor. She reached her long slender arm into the dust-covered pocket and grabbed whatever was refracting the light with her index and middle finger. She pulled it out with a grunt, clinging onto whatever she grabbed, it was pretty heavy.

She stood back up straight and palmed what she picked up. Brushing her hair out of her face she looked at what she grabbed.

A necklace. A fancy necklace. A huge sapphire lay as the centerpiece, with rubies and diamonds and sapphires creating the chain. Morrigan rolled the stone over in her fingers in bewilderment. The creation was beautiful, dust-covered, but beautiful.

From this moment on Morrigan could do one of two things:

•Return the necklace back to where she found it, hike down to the Slutty Cage and call Luke to inform him she was OK and that she had a lead in the case

Or:

•Pocket the necklace, hike down to the Slutty Cage, maybe grab a drink to refresh, talk to Candy, then call Luke and tell him what she found with as many jokes as she could manage.

Obviously, Morrigan shoved the necklace into her pocket and turned to the door. Reaching the outside she looked off into the distance to see the storm crawling quickly over the forest, and the last of the light falling behind her. She sighed and started walking. If she can’t beat the night, she could at least beat the rain.

It had been no more than a few minutes and Morrigan's body was working against her. She was slowly trudging her way back to the club, her eyes were heavy and she was yawning every five seconds. She had not realized how tired she actually was until she was left alone with her thoughts in the middle of Mother Nature.

She tried to keep her mind occupied by repeating the features of Lefty over and over in her head, but she kept getting distracted by the little cuts and bruises that sprinkled her body after her fall from the truck. Morrigan shook her head and started thinking about Lefty again.

With about another excruciating ten minutes of walking, Morrigan made it back to The Slutty Cage. A wave of relief rushed over her just as thunder crashed and lightning lit up the twilight sky. Thank God for the large neon sign that illuminated the world around her, Morrigan would’ve walked right past the place tucked into the trees if it weren't for that sign.

Making her way into the bar she was greeted with a fully dressed Candy, Looking like she was just about to leave. “Oh, hey M- Oh my God!” Candy’s eyes widened as immediately noticed Morrigan's injured state. “What happened to you!?”

Instead of telling Candy what happened she came up with an obvious fake excuse. “I tried to stand on top of a car and shoot at the enemy like James Bond, or was it Michael Bay-?” Morrigan yawned half way through her fake excuse. “But it didn't work out to well and ended with me walking 30 minutes back here,” Morrigan said, stretching her shoulders and wincing in pain. “Could I borrow a phone? Marco never gave me mine back. That son of a bitch.” She said jokingly clenching her fist with her uninjured arm.

“You look like hell,” Candy said as she started to fumble around in her bag.

“Just got back.” Morrigan laughed. “Sorry had to reference _Heathers_ , no more though.”

“I’ve never seen that movie.” Candy said as she handed Morrigan her iPhone coated in a fluffy pink case. “Do you need any place to lie down?”

“Yes, that would be wonderful. And hold on, you’ve never seen _Heathers_? How old are you?!” Morrigan said as Candy placed her hand on the small of Morrigan back, guiding her to the back room.

“Twenty-seven,” Candy replied. Morrigan groaned as she lay down. Candy crouched down beside her.

“Really? I’m twenty-four. I guess our parents raised us differently.”

“I was more of a Sunday cartoons gal,” Candy laughed. “You sure are pretty chipper for a girl who just fell off a car.”

“Well, out of it, but you know,” Morrigan said. “Password?” Morrigan held the phone out to Candy.

“5477.”

“Wow, really you’re just going to give it to me like that? Pretty brave.” Morrigan typed in the code on the phone, unlocking it to a pink background.

“I trust you. You’re cute and are friends with Marco. So I know you’re a good gal.” Candy said standing up.

“You’re sweet, like candy,” Morrigan looked up grinned as she pulled up the phone keypad.

Candy gave her a playful glare “Oh, I haven’t heard that one before.”

Morrigan wanted to say something back but yawned in place of it. Her eyes felt heavy again. “Hey, do you think you could get me a glass of water?” She asked, voice suddenly husky. Candy nodded and bounced off to the bar. Morrigan was left alone in the neon-lit back room.

Now for the hard part, who should she call?

  
________________________

  
Luke was losing his mind. He read file after file of everything he could. Break-in, petty theft, anything he could get his hands on to prove that Lefty and Jon existed.

Nothing. No luck.

Luke sat in his office with his head in his hands, Nora had made some good points about how it wouldn't make sense for Walker to deviate from his normal style and kill someone, even if he was caught. But in the end, that still wasn't enough either. They had as much as they did three years ago.

Luke's phone rang and he absently put it up to his ear and gave a tired “Miller.”

“I would say ‘I think that I'm Tom Cruise’ but I didn't slide over a car while I was shooting, I was pushed out of a car while being shot at,” Morrigan's groggy voice came. Luke's head shot up at the speed of light.

“Morrigan? Wha- Where are you? Getting pushed out of a car? How are you contacting me?” Luke yelled into the phone, a million questions flying at once.

“I'm at The Slutty Cage come get me,” Morrigan said, only choosing to answer one of the questions. “I'm hanging up now, I'm tired,”

“Wait! Morrigan-” Luke started.

“Also, your shoes untied,” Morrigan added before closing the call. Luke's eyes shot down to see his left shoe untied. His eyes widened and tied it before running out to the bullpen and relaying the info Morrigan had just given him. Everyone got into positions to go retrieve the reckless forensic anthropologist.

  
________________________

  
Luke anticipated seeing Morrigan like this when they got to the club. She had passed out on a red velvet couch with purple neon lights highlighting her brown skin. Luke looked worriedly at the paramedics examining her.

“Good news it's shes going to be fine, it's just a few scrapes. Nothing bad.” The parametric said stepping away from Morrigan. “She's got a rapid heartbeat, has she been consuming lots of sugar recently?”

“Yeah, to stay awake. Is that why she passed out?” Luke asked glancing at Morrigan.

“She didn't she's…” The parametric trailed off. “Sleeping.” Luke glanced at her and frowned. At least she was finally sleeping.

The Slutty Cage had been surrounded by police, Luke was dismayed to find that Marco wasn’t there but it was a long shot that he was anyway. Luke felt like a weight had been lifted off his chest, he told himself over and over that Morrigan was fine and she was lying right in front of him. But that didn't seem to stop the tremor in his fingers.

“Is she ok?” Luke looked out from the room to see a fluffy blonde-haired woman looking worriedly at Morrigan. “I left for just a bit, did she pass out from dehydration? I gave her some water but…”

Luke recognized her as Candice, the stripper who he talked to earlier.

“Yes, she's fine,” Luke said, he motioned for her to come over which Candy nervously stepped into the room watching Morrigan worriedly. “So, you do know Morrigan?” Luke said.

Candy lowered her head in shame. “Yes…” She said, giving an apologetic nod. “But I had no idea she would get hurt! She was so cheerful I just assumed she was…Okay...” Candy trailed off.

“Did you know Walker too? Morrigan was kidnapped by him,” Luke asked. Candy’s eyes widened, her head shot up to meet Lukes's stern black eyes.

“What? Kidnapped? that can't be…” Candy trailed off and she looked back to Morrigan. “She… They were so nice and comfortable with each other…” Candy shut herself up at Lukes's eye twitch.

“Be honest this time, lying to a federal agent is a crime, you know. Was Morrigan here looking for ‘guys’?” Luke air quoted.

“They just asked if I had seen anyone of the name of Lefty or Jon…”

“Of course they did.” Luke pinched the bridge of his nose. “Let me go get my pen…” Luke sighed in defeat, walking out of the room, leaving Candy all alone.

“Candy…” Morrigan groaned from the couch.

“Morrigan!” Candy cried, rushing over to Morrigan’s side. “What? what is it?”

“Don't let anyone take this,” Morrigan said in a raspy voice. She reached into her pocket and pulled out the necklace, sliding it into Candy's hand.

Oh my-” Candy wanted to ask Morrigan more but Luke walked back into the room; she shoved it into her jacket pocket and stepped away.

“Hey, Lukey!” Morrigan said. “Nice to see you!”

“Morrigan you’re wake!” Luke said in shock. “Someone get the paramedics!”

“No, no, I'm fine, listen, I've got something to tell you...” Morrigan said, yawning on her last word.

“We’re going to get you to the hospital, you have a rapid heartbeat.” Luke said.

“Oh, I guess that's what happens when someone pushes you out of a moving car,” Morrigan said.

“No- wait, what? You were pushed out of a car?” Luke asked, finally processing the information.

“It was only going, like, twenty mph but when I tell everyone I'm upping it to sixty and also saying the car had a bomb attached to it that would blow up if we went below fifty.”

“That's _Speed_.” Luke deadpanned.

“Is it?” Morrigan grinned knowing damn well that it was. “Huh, listen I've got something to tell you,” Morrigan said motioning for Luke to come closer. “Come here,”

Luke kneeled down next to the drowsy Morrigan. “What is it?” He asked in a hushed tone.

“There's a warehouse a few miles up, inside it, you will find a hole in the wall that I made with a crowbar. Inside that wall is a skeleton.” Morrigan responded, tone equally as hushed.

“What?”

“A human one, don't ask me how I found it, I'm too tired to explain. I'll just say I'm psychic,”

“A human body?” Luke repeated. “You waited till now to tell me this?”

Morrigan nodded and yawed. “But don't you just love a dramatic reveal? He was wearing a lot of blue jean stuff. Go get him.”

“What- That wasn't dramatic! You're lying on a velvet couch in a strip club!” Luke cried. “I need more information than that!”

“Hmm, too tired…” Luke couldn't ask Morrigan anything else because the paramedics came in and shooed him away, taking Morrigan out to go to the hospital.

Luke had completely forgotten about Candy after that bombshell Morrigan dropped on him. He shook his head in shock and left the back room to go check out this 'warehouse,' leaving a frightened Candy palming a large sapphire necklace in her pocket.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan awoke in a cold sweat from a sleep that she didn't even consent too. It was three AM according to the clock on the T.V. She was in a hospital bed. She frowned, she never really liked hospitals. She couldn't believe Luke made her go! Her head hurt, her mouth was dry, everything was spinning.

Hundreds of thoughts flew through Morrigan's head as she tried to regain control of her surroundings. She rubbed her eyes and looked down. She was still in her clothing from today. Really? Did Luke just drop her off at the hospital so she could sleep under supervised watch? Morrigan yawned. She needed a Red Bull.

Morrigan slid her bare feet onto the cold tile floor, it chilled her to the bone. Shakily she stood up, her head pounding from her large sugar crash. And you know what the best thing for a sugar crash is? More sugar.

Morrigan creaked open the door and poked her head into the hallway, it was quiet and fluorescently lit, stabbing into her pounding headache. All lights in the hospital pointed to it being day-time, yet there wasn't a single soul in sight. Quietly she tiptoed out and went on a quest to find the nearest vending machine.

After a few wrong turns and an awkward run-in with a nurse, Morrigan found a vending machine. Each prize was lit up with another fluorescent light. Morrigan scanned each product as she fumbled the change she still had hidden in her pocket.

“Really? No Red Bull?” She said aloud.

“Because we find that not the most healthy thing to put in a hospital.”

Morrigan spun around to see Rita's older sister, Dr. Rosé Samone looking at her disappointedly, holding a clipboard against her white-coated body, a white hijab to match.

“Ah!” Morrigan raised her arms in greeting. “Rosé! How's the surgery tonight?”

“Go back to your room Dr. Star,” Rosé said, warningly pointing a pen at her. “Agent Miller gave me specific instructions to keep you here overnight till he can pick you up in the morning.”

“Wow, Luke is picking me up?” Morrigan said. “That's so sweet of him, if I didn't know better I'd say he cares about me,”

“You need to stop talking and— Room. Now.” Rosé pointed. Morrigan held up her hands in defeat.

“Ok, ok…” Morrigan trudged back to her room, not wanting to spend another second in the hospital. She considered running and heading off somewhere, but something told her that that would really do more harm than good.

She stumbled back into her room, hearing the click of the door behind her. Morrigan sighed. Sleep didn’t come as it used too, the late air hung with hospital chemicals and rain.

Morrigan’s body was weak and restless, her fingers shook from her sugar withdrawal. The three AM hospital air was heavy with silence, even the outside world seemed silent. She gulped, staring into the room trying to find some sort of refuge in the darkness. She fell onto the white hospital sheets and bore her eyes into the equally as white ceiling. She would just have to stay up till she could get her next fix of Red Bull in.

Her thousand-pound eyelids were making that really hard. Morrigan blinked over and over again, trying to force the sleep away. Yet, it only made her more and more tired. She couldn’t think straight. Maybe just a few minutes wouldn’t hurt…

Before Morrigan knew it, she was asleep.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan opened her eyes to an empty interrogation room, the only light was shining down from the diminishing yellow lamp overhead. The walls surrounding her looked older than her own existence. Shadows crawled up the walls, filled with whispers.

Morrigan’s head flew alive with realization.

Another dream.

Suddenly her skin began to crawl. Whispers tickled her ears, each one just a little too quiet to make out what it was.

“H͎͖̝e̪͓̯̣l̨̗̖͚̭͙͇l͢ǫ̬?” was all Morrigan could manage to say out loud. The whispers spiked in volume, gnawing at her full of a mournful sound that made the hairs on the back of Morrigan's neck prickle. The walls around her slowly covered with tar, turning into a roaring black horizon. Whispers started to snake their way up around Morrigan's legs, making her jump out of her seat in an attempt to get away.

It didn’t help and the voices got louder and louder, each one a different song, poem or speech. Morrigan took a step away from the table and watched as it was consumed by darkness leaving her in an entirely empty, spacious darkness. Thousands of eyes screamed beneath her skull; she knew what that meant.

There was something watching her.

Deep in the darkness, a giant suspended plane of existence stared back at Morrigan. It was like looking in some remorseless mirror, reflecting the grief and fear for what Morrigan stood for. The dimensionless and timeless plane rotated slowly, jets of weaving colors like a black opal stone.

A voice spoke out through sizzling static that could only be described as her own, full with all the colors of the realities she consumed for her own gain. She was presented with a few words.

E̼̯̰̗̺v̹̹̘͜e͓͇͙r̮̰̳̹͠y͎̤̯̺͜t̜͖̝̻̼͕h̛̬̱̦͎̭i̧͚̰̗̠̤̙̗n̴̮̟͈g̜̹̘̹ ͉͇̳̹̖̠wi̯̝̺̥̻̞͝l̡͇͍͇̝͙͔l͓̜͇̞̜͔̬ ͏͉͚̳͇ṣ͕͝o̖͖o̮̲͙n̬̟͖̼̘̪̻ ̧b̭̜̻̫̘̥e̱͚͈̼̜̻͟ͅ ̩̖͙̺̤ͅc̢̞̖̠͇̦ͅo̢̗͓̬̥n͖̙̠̻̳d̨͕̫̫ͅe͔̮̳̱̼m͔͎̜̮̺n̴e̕d͖͞ ͇̞̩̜ͅt̗͎ͅơ̺̗̪ͅ ͔͕̰͚̪͝d̦e̹̥͚̩a͉̹̯t̤͢h̵̩͈̙̗͓ ̟̯̤̺̥̹͘by̻̱̰̯̪ y̨̝̫̱͇̠͎ͅo̺͔̖̥̗̠u̵͇͉͙̜r ̘̼̳͕̳h̹a͕̟̮n͔̺͙d̲͕͘s

The Calamity shut her eyes and tried to focus on waking herself up. She could feel the heavy eyes beneath her skull, watching. To live was one thing, but to live and face your own reflection? It's like black asphalt crating your skin, a wake-up call.

The Calamity squeezed her eyes tighter than a rope, trying to wish away the reality. The reality that everyone is dying, everything is dying, the planes of existence also, soon to be devoured by The Calamity herself.

M͙̠o͇̥rr̢͈͚i̠̗̺̯̠ͅg͉̳̞̙a̭̤̞͙͜n̶̹̗͎̹͖͕.͙͕̖͔̙̞͇.̜͠.͏̬͖  
̗̠̥̤̬͖̝͘  
No matter how long she denied the truth, refusing to acknowledge what comes next or what follows after, the end game sat there. It was woven into the strings of fate, the very ones that The Calamity wrapped around her own hand and pulled along with her.

͝M̯͉͇͖̼͡or̪̳̯͍ͅr͓̹͎i͙͈̩͜g̺̲͉̩̤͠a҉̦͖̗n̰͍̘͇̙̜̟͘.͖̥̬̫̘̺̠.̺͈̤͕̣.͟

She stood in the middle of all of it. She put herself there, and she had done it time and time again. She was the inky black darkness that claimed each plane of existence, consuming them for her own. At one point she would have to move on, to forget the way the rain fell and how the sunset and let it fall into her hands. She, The Calamity, was what walked forever, and the plane beneath her would at one point have to-

MORRIGAN!

Morrigan shot awake. Shooting up from her uncomfortable position on her bed Morrigan was back in the hospital with back pain and the lingering feeling of fear. Rosé stood over her with a blank expression.

“I’ve been trying to wake you up for, like, five minutes. You sure are a heavy sleeper.” Rosé said.

Morrigan blinked her adjusting eyes a few times and groaned. Her eyes shot over to the window to see the sun had made its way over the horizon and splashed the world with light. Morrigan's body warmed up in the morning light.

“Seriously, you didn’t have to wake me up by screaming in my ear…” Morrigan groaned. “What happened to beauty sleep?”

“Agent Miller is here,” Rosé said. “He’s waiting at the front desk, and I put your belongings on the table over there.” She nodded over to the bedside table with a neatly folded jacket and shoes.

“Thanks…” Morrigan murmured, pulling herself off of the uncomfortable bed and rubbing her eyes. When she finally got a hold of her surroundings, Rosé was gone. Morrigan sighed and stood up, taking a second to breathe in the crisp hospital air.

Morrigan grabbed her stuff and made her way slowly to the front desk. She stopped a hallway away and watched from a distance. Luke stood at the front desk checking his watch every few seconds and tapped his foot every now and then. Morrigan took a deep breath in, composing herself as she walked over.

“Luke!” Morrigan cried with open arms, startling him as she reached him.

“Oh thank God,” Luke let out a breath. “You're here. Alive and well. Did you sleep?”

Morrigan stiffened, but still managed to throw her classic wide smile. “Yes! A few hours. You know, I’ve never really liked hospitals, I think it’s the lighting,” Morrigan rambled. “And if I'm being honest, I feel like I'm hungover.”

“You came down from a sugar rush, I would expect so.” Luke snapped. Morrigan bit her lip.

“Well, I don't know if alcohol and sugar are mutually exclusive...” Morrigan said.

“They're both drugs. Let's go.” Luke grumbled and grabbed Morrigan's arm and started to drag her to the exit. Morrigan studied him carefully. He looked so tired, it looked like he was the one who needs to sleep. His tan skin was clammy and cold against Morrigan, his eyes drooped and held eye bags so dark you see them a mile away.

“I'm getting the feeling there's a cold wall of ice between us,” Morrigan said. Luke ignored her. As the two got outside Morrigan twisted out of Luke's touch “Hey, hey, hey, Mr. Grabby! What's that all about?”

“I just want to make sure you don't get kidnapped again.” Luke's voice didn't have his usual bite to it, it sounded tired and strained. Morrigan's chest tightened but she shook it off.

“So what's up with that body I pointed out to you?” Morrigan said.

“Nozomi and T.G are on it.”

“Well, what about debriefing me? I mean I'm sure I'm a lot of help, I know a lot about this case, ooh! I could even help you with finding the guys-”

“No.” Luke cut her off. “I don't want you getting kidnapped again.”

“That was so long ago! You're not over that yet? I know I am!” Morrigan said. Luke did not respond, he turned away and walked to the black SUV set out front. Morrigan deflated and went after him. “I mean, I wasn't even kidnapped, I went with him willingly-”

Morrigan didn't get to finish talking because Luke spun around and slapped Morrigan with enough force to knock her back and reel over. Morrigan held her cheek for a split second, she rose back up quickly and was stopped with the sight in front of her.

Tears poured from Luke's eyes.

“Don't say that! Do you not care what happens to you? What if you had gotten killed?” Luke yelled at her. “What would we do? What would Yin do? Lola, Rita, Nozomi, me-” His voice broke he bowed his head.

Morrigan stood in shock her mouth agape at Luke sobbing in front of her. She tried to stutter out a response as she walked over and placed a hand on Luke's shoulder. “Luke, it's ok... I wasn't in danger….” She trailed off.

“SHUT UP!” In a quick motion, Luke slammed Morrigan against the car, knocking the wind out of her. Luke didn't meet her eyes and kept ranting. “Morrigan, we care about you, you're one of the people to ties this team together! You're my best friend! We may have not gotten along at first but I warmed up and changed! You didn't! You’ve been nothing but a dickbag who never thinks about the people around her!”

Morrigan watched Luke carefully, placing his movements. Luke continued with his rant.

“You’re not an agent for God’s sake! Stop living your life like one! Throwing yourself into the middle of danger should not be your life goal! You can't fight back! Your slick talk can only get you so far!” Luke screeched.

He reeled his hand back to slap her again but Morrigan's emotions got the better of her; The Calamity was on him in a second. Luke couldn't even register what was happening as Morrigan buried her fist into his stomach, knocking the wind out of him. Luke was slammed against the car where Morrigan formerly stood, her forearm slamming against his neck, cutting off his airway.

Luke gasped for air as The Calamity stared him down. _“Luke,”_ The Calamity said warningly, shadows creeping up her face. _“If I fought back you'd be dead.”_ Luke tried to get her off of him but no such luck as he lost more and more of his breath.

“M-Morrigan-” He choked out, scratching at her forearm hard enough that blood pricked up and stained his pale fingers. Luke's eyes met Morrigan's glare and was immediately hit with coldness. Her eyes were a swirling pool of gold, running over his body and coating him with fear. Luke knew something was terribly wrong. He closed his eyes and tried to shake the feeling. His air came back as Morrigan relaxed off him and let him fall to his knees.

“What… the hell… is your problem...” Luke choked out, gasping for breath. Morrigan towered over him. Luke looked at her to give her a nasty look but was met with a face of fear. On Morrigan Star's face.

“Luke…” Morrigan, realizing what she had done, leaned down and sat beside Luke. Her voice was quivering and she cautiously watched him. The only sound was the passing cars from the street, the occasional morning bird and Luke gasping for breath. For the first time in Morrigan's existence, she felt guilty. “I'm sorry... ” Morrigan said bluntly, unable to find any other words to say. Luke turned and looked at her with an exasperated look as he clutched his neck where a bruise was slightly forming.

“For what?! Choking me half to death or being a dick?!”

Morrigan bowed her head. “A little bit of both...”

“You almost killed me!”

Morrigan looked over at Luke, feeling sick to her stomach as she watched her friend gasp for breath on the asphalt ground, rubbing his throat. Her mind wouldn’t focus, it’s was fighting against itself. Luke had his head bowed and put on a stoic stance but Morrigan felt the energy she knew all too well manifest.

Fear. Fear of her.

“Is this how you plan to live? Pushing those who care about you further and further away?” Luke snapped. “I'm coming this close to getting you pulled away from the F.B.I for good.”

Morrigan gulped. “You're not going to do that, The Director loves me, she’ll shut you down. Just like when we first started working together,”

Luke stumbled to his feet, breath finally caught, and looked up at Morrigan. For the first time, he was looking at her with real contempt. “This isn't like when we first started working together. I could make a pretty damn good case for it now. Tampering with evidence, obstruction of justice and so many other crimes you commit to what? Have a little fun?”

“What makes you think I'm doing this for fun?!” Morrigan shot up and yelled back. She wanted to believe that lie herself, too.

“There's no way you truly care. I don't think you have it in you.” Luke scoffed. “You never change, no matter what.”

“What does that even mean?!” Morrigan demanded. “I'm sticking my tail out for a guy the entire F.B.I is convinced is a cold-blooded murderer! Before you tell me to get off my high horse, get the hell off of yours. You're an agent, you're supposed to protect the innocent! This is what you wanted!”

“What I wanted?” Luke let out a bitter laugh and jabbed a finger at Morrigan. “What I want is for you to stop living your life as an agent, I want you to stick to what you're good at, I don't want the next body to roll into the lab be yours!”

“I'm not going to die!” Morrigan shouted back. “I'm more in control of everything around me then you might think I am, Luke.”

“Oh, so what? You're god? You control how everything plays out?” Luke said. “Your unbridled confidence will only get you so far, one day everything is going to backfire and I won't be there to save you.”

“Who says I need you to save me?!”

“The fact that you can't seem to keep yourself from getting hurt! Why are you even like this?”

Morrigan couldn't stutter anything else out. They couldn't argue, not with them on completely different levels of thought. What could she say? She was running out of ways to tell everyone that she was always safe, she would never die. The only sound was both of them breathing. The early morning traffic passed by unbothered by the two staring each other down.

Luke was the first to say something, Relaxing and looking at Morrigan with sad eyes. “You beg us to trust you, to believe that you know everything. Yet, you never trust us. You don't listen to our advice or please. If you cared at all-” Luke stopped and sighed. “If you cared at all, you wouldn't be putting yourself in dangerous situations and stressing us all out.”

Morrigan’s breath was shaky and she was desperately trying to keep herself from collapsing onto the ground. She and Luke fought, it was in their nature as partners, but never like this. Luke looked at her with sad eyes that started to tear up again, Morrigan suddenly wished for the sting of his slap across her face. Anything was better than having to confront the fact that she messed up. Big time.

“Uber to the F.B.I,” Luke said as he jumped into the van. “Nora will debrief you. Then go home.” He started up the car and drove off without another word.

Finally, with Luke gone, Morrigan's legs gave out, and she fell against the ground. The last time she fought with someone like that was her mother. When that happened, The Calamity disappeared off this plane of existence for a year. But Morrigan couldn't leave anymore, this wasn't a petty fight with a woman she posed as a child for. This was her life. In this moment, left alone in a hospital parking lot, Morrigan was truly human.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan was forced to sit in the empty room and wait for Nora. Whether it was on purpose on not, Morrigan didn’t know. Morrigan wasn't sure how many minutes had passed but it was enough for her to count 1687 dots on the ceiling patterns.

Morrigan looked down from the ceiling at the click of the door, seeing the Guccied out woman make her entrance with a brown leather notebook.

“Hello, Morrigan.” Nora smiled. “Good to see you're well-rested.”

Morrigan didn't bother to smile back. “You don't look that well-rested, long night? Looking for Walker?” Morrigan tried to antagonize, even though Nora looked fantastic, not a smudge in her makeup was visible.

Nora only smiled and ignored the fight Morrigan was waving out in front of her, and walked over to the interrogation table, sitting down in front of her. “Why don’t we get started? No need to antagonize me.”

Morrigan rolled her eyes. “I’m not.”

“Then stop acting like a child and tell me what happened,” Nora said. Morrigan closed her mouth and glared.

“What do you want to know?”

“Why don't we start at the beginning, at the parking garage,” Nora suggested, opening her fancy leather notebook and brushing some of her curly hair out of her eyes. “What made you want to follow Luke and Nimah there?”

“Their facial expressions,” Morrigan said simply. “They looked so serious, I was dying to know what they were up too.”

“Agents with serious facial expressions usually doesn’t mean good things. You went in knowing that?” Nora said.

“Of course I did,” Morrigan rolled her eyes. Nora nodded and wrote something down in her notebook. “It was a surprise to meet Marco there but I knew he wouldn’t hurt me...”

“And you were absolutely sure of that, the second you met him. You took one look at him and knew he wouldn’t hurt you?”

Morrigan bit her lip. No, at the start she had no way of knowing if Marco was going to shoot her or not. In fact, she was entirely ready to kill him if she had too. “When he pulled over and asked for my help I noticed he had the safety on for his gun, what kind of killer does that?” Morrigan said.

“So, back at the warehouse, you had no idea if he was going to kill you or not? You took a gamble on your life.”

“What is this? A debriefing or a way for you profile me for your sick little book?” Morrigan spat.

Nora didn’t even flinch and Morrigan’s accusations of her obsession with profiling the people around her. “I’m trying to learn about your motivations.”

“Don’t think you’re going to magically fix me, believe me, it won’t work,” Morrigan said. “You want to learn about Marco. Not me.”

Nora smiled blankly. “So tell me about him, why were you so ready to believe him to be innocent?”

“Because he said so,” Morrigan said.

“You based your case on the word of a con-man?” Nora asked.

“Well, and the fact he had the safety on for his gun. Murderers don’t take hostages with empty guns, they don’t try and clear their names and they don't ask a forensic anthropologist they saw on the news for help. If he left the country as soon as he got out he could be sitting on the beach sipping margaritas and sticking his feet in the sand.” Morrigan said. “He asked me specifically for help, and there was no way I could say no.”

“So you let Walker drag you around? For what?” Nora asked.

“We were looking for any trace for his partners. Lefty and Jon. We stopped at a club they frequented at, and then a warehouse that they worked at. Turns out they’re definitely real, well Lefty at least. Suck it, Luke.” Morrigan said.

“So you don't know who truly killed the family?”

“If I did I wouldn't be here, I would be dramatically revealing my findings to the F.B.I, maybe even sipping on a Red Bull.”

Nora cocked her head to the side and wrote a few things in her notebook, leaving the room quiet and uncomfortable.

“You're aware that we found a body, right?” Nora asked, looking up from her notes. “If anything you're getting further away from proving Walker innocent.”

“You think I don't know that?” Morrigan snapped. “But if you just stopped focusing on Marco for one second, maybe we would get a little closer to clearing his name!”

“He's a dangerous fugitive, Morrigan. He pushed you out of a moving car.” Nora said.

Morrigan huffed. “You're taking that completely out of context! He did that to save me from the bullets Lefty was shooting at us with. No bad intentions there.”

“You have no reason to believe Walker would be lying to you? You're sure he's a saint?”

“I am right that he’s not a killer,” Morrigan said. “But still, I kind of keep forgetting that Luke's not all wrong about him, either.”

”What do you mean?” Nora asked.

“Marcos not a killer, but he is a thief, a con man,” Morrigan said. “I know he's not telling me everything,”

“You would know,” Nora said.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Morrigan shot back.

“You seem to lie a lot, even about the little things. I would go as far as to say you yourself are a con man.” Nora said.

“Yeah, well takes one to know one I guess,” Morrigan grumbled.

“Then you’d better figure out what it is he’s not telling you,” Nora said.

Morrigan gave an irritated glance. “You say that like I own all the knowledge in the universe.”

Nora chuckled slightly and closed her book. She set the pen elegantly on top of it and slid the book to the left.

Morrigan perked up at the action and straightened up. “That it? We’re all caught up now.”

“Heard you and Luke got into a fight,” Nora said.

Morrigan suppressed a groan and eye roll. She was dreading this, Of course, Nora knew when all the drama happened. She was the head psychologist. “Yeah, and? Let me guess, you desperately want to know my motivations for it, more information to add to your book.” Morrigan mocked.

Nora frowned, her eyes studied Morrigan, who knew full well she was being profiled. “Seriously what happened?”

“Nothing. It wasn't anything new. He's mad that I'm sticking my neck out and is trying to force me to quit the way I live my life,” Morrigan gritted her teeth. “Why do you even care?”

“Because even if you don't, I consider you a friend. I can tell when something has really shaken you up, at this point. You're shaken up.”

“I think that might be because I've consumed two cases of Red Bull in the past 24 hours.”

“Come on, Morrigan,” Nora said. “We were scared, we thought you were dead.”

Morrigan deflated and was hit with guilt again. “I wasn't trying to hurt, Luke… It's just sometimes he doesn't listen… He sees everything in such a black and white manner.”

“So you get yourself kidnapped to get his attention? How does that even work?” Nora said. “Have you ever tried talking to him?”

“I…” Morrigan stopped. “I get results faster if I do it myself…”

“So what? You shouldn't be out doing reckless things like this just because it's faster.”

“I can live my life how I want to,” Morrigan said. “You guys keep trying to make me change, it's none of your business how I live my life.”

“Is that such a bad thing?” Nora cocked her head to the side. “Luke cares about you a significant amount. We all do. We were afraid this was the case where we would be seeing you in a body bag. What's so bad about wanting our friend to be more careful?”

“Marco would never kill me,” Morrigan said. “I’ve been saying this from the start but no one would believe me when I would say I was completely safe.”

“This isn't about Walker. There were other factors to this case, Morrigan. You were shot at,” Nora said. “You take your safety for granted, the whole thing could have gone very differently. I can't imagine why you would put your life in such danger, I'm sure if your father could see you now he would be disappointed in how you handle cases.”

Morrigan's demeanor darkened. “What the hell do you know about my father,” Morrigan growled. The light overhead flickered, shadows the room grew darker for just a split second. “Don't try to drag your psychologist shit into my life, and especially not my father’s.”

“I'm worried about you.”

“Get in line,”

Nora remained unmoving. “Why are you so set on proving Walker innocent?”

Morrigan paused and thought for a second. “Because no one else will,” Morrigan said. Nora nodded thoughtfully.

Nora pursed her lips and gave Morrigan a look. “You're hiding something from me.”

Morrigan shrugged. “I've told you everything.” She turned away to leave again.

“Morrigan,” Nora said sharply. “We’re not finished.”

Morrigan groaned and sat back down at the desk. “What do you want from me? I went along with your questioning. What else do you want? Do you want me to confess how bad my childhood was and how it made me the person I am today?”

“I want to ask you- as a friend--”

Morrigan groaned loudly, making a show about her uninterest.

“-How long till you misjudge? How long till you're not in control? How long until you've pushed everyone away so you can't turn to anyone for help?”

“Is that what you're concerned about? You're worried about my judgment?” Morrigan asked. “I almost can't believe it, I expect you to go on some rant about trying to hold up the good name of the F.B.I...”

“At one point you're going to be wrong, and if it's not you who gets hurt, it's going to be someone else,” Nora said.

Morrigan felt sick. “I'm very rarely wrong. I know for a fact that no one innocent will get hurt,”

“You're choosing your words carefully. I can tell,” Nora said. “You're lying to yourself, you know someone's going to get hurt at some point.”

“Yeah? And?” Morrigan shot back. “I have the power to stop that from happening, so why wouldn't I? I can help Marco, he's innocent.”

“Why are you so set on this case? Nora asked. “What you clicked when you saw Marco and decided you wanted to go through the troubles of fighting with your best friend to solve a case of a man you just met?”

“Protect and serve? Sound familiar?” Morrigan said. “Murderers don't stick around in a city crawling with F.B.I and try to clear their name,” Morrigan waved her hand. “I've seen it a million times in crime shows.”

“I don't think you should be citing crime fiction as real-life evidence,”

“Yeah well...” Morrigan picked at a loose string on her sweater, shrugging off Nora's comments.

“What can I do to help?”

Morrigan picked her head up and stared into Nora's chocolate brown eyes suspiciously. “Help? I don't get it. What's the catch? Weekly therapy sessions?”

“No catch. I'm seriously offering you a hand here because I know as soon as you walk out of this room you're going to weave yourself back into this case,” Nora smiled. “I will offer therapy if you need it.”

“It was a joke, I’m never doing therapy with you,” Morrigan said. She thought for a second. “I'm stuck on something. I don't know why Marco broke out. That's the part I’m missing.”

“From our investigation, we’ve concluded the reason Walker broke out was to get at a precious necklace that showed up on the black market.”

“Woah! You’re just going to tell me? Just like that?” Morrigan asked in shock. “That’s what you came up with? Really?”

“It the thing that fit best into the timeline. An expensive necklace turns up and days later he’s out of jail. He’s a thief, what do you expect?” Nora shrugged.

“That's so dumb…” Morrigan sighed. “I just can't shake the feeling he's lying to me about something.”

“He is a con man, con men tend to lie until they're threatened with their life,” Nora said.

That caught Morrigan's attention, a plan already forming in her head. “Threatened with their life, huh…”

“My experience anyway,” Nora nodded. “You're free to go if you want.”

“I am? Finally, I can get out of this uncomfortable cold room?”

“Yes.”

Morrigan stood up and started to head to the door but Nora grabbed her wrist for one last statement. Morrigan looked down at her. Nora gave a small smile.

“Think about apologizing to Luke for your actions.”

Morrigan shook off her hand and turned away and left without another word.

After a cold four-minute walk to her car still parked in the lab parking lot across the street, she got in; Falling onto the uncomfortable leather, cold with the overnight air. Morrigan rested her head onto the steering wheel and closed her eyes. No way Luke was going to let her even breathe near this case. He was still too much on edge.

Morrigan didn't even bother turning on the car as she sat, just listening to her breathing. Her work phone's harsh ringtone cut into the solitude silence. Morrigan sighed, hoping it was Lola or someone to get her mind off all the uncomfortable thoughts swirling in her head. She grabbed the phone with her eyes still closed and answered.

“Star,” She greeted.

“Oh thank God I reached you!”

Morrigan's eyes shot open at the familiar voice on the other end. “Candy?”

“Yeah, it's me. I looked you up to find some way to contact you and I found your work phone on the Yang Institution website, I hope you don't mind.”

“No, no, not at all, what's up?” Morrigan asked, sitting up straight in the car seat.

“Remember last night?” Candy said.

“I remember everything.” Morrigan squinted.

“Well some guy came in here looking for Marco, and he looked a lot like the way you described the Lefty guy!”

“He came to the bar?” Morrigan said in shock. “When? What did he want?”

“I'd rather not talk about it over the phone… Can you come to the club?”

“I'll be right over.”

“Thank Jesus,” Candy sighed in relief. “See you soon.”

Morrigan hung up and peeled out of the parking lot and speed over to the club. The drive was light and short, only about ten minutes, but it was enough to wake Morrigan up and get her focused back onto the case. She rolled in to see Candy waiting outside cautiously when she noticed Morrigan in the car she ran over to her and Morrigan stepped out.

“What's wrong? What happened?” Morrigan asked.

“I don't know...” Candy whispered. “He came into the bar last night and started looking around asking about Marco… We didn't say anything but he said that he might have something of his…” Candy slid the necklace into Morrigan's palm gracefully, to the untrained eye would've had never noticed it.

“Yeah?” Morrigan said.

“He said it was priceless and it got me thinking,” Candy nodded to the necklace. “It looks really fancy and I don't know the way you wanted me to hide it from the F.B.I...I didn't know who else to call. I didn't know what else to do with that. You have to promise me you won’t Lefty get this, I don't want Marco to get hurt.”

“I promise, I'll keep it safe.” Morrigan smiled.

“You're not going to tell the F.B.I are you?” Candy asked.

“No,” Morrigan said. “I didn't even tell the F.B.I he's affiliated with this place. I didn't want you guys to get into trouble.”

“Thank you so much!” Candy said happily. She leaned up and gave Morrigan a kiss on the cheek. “You're a doll.”

“You too.” Morrigan waved bye as she got back into her car. She watched as Candy bounced back into the bar. Morrigan sighed. She knew she should stop lying to Luke and loop him into what she knows, but she also reallllyyyy liked Candy and promised she wouldn't tell.

She could go and tell Luke right now, he was up at the warehouse overseeing the forensics crew extracting the bones she found. The question was who was more important: Luke Miller, F.B.I and her best friend, or: Candy, a stripper she just met a day ago.

Did Morrigan even have to say who it was? Of course, it was Candy. Morrigan started up her car and was about to start her trek back to the city when a black van sped past her on the road with its sirens blaring.

Was that Luke? Did it matter? Because Morrigan was going to follow it anyway regardless. She peeled her way out of the parking lot, skidding up dirt with her tires and speeding off to follow the black van to wherever it was headed.

  
________________________

  
Crime scene tape and sirens were never a good sign, Morrigan watched from across the street in her car as Luke jumped out of the van and Lola pulled up in the C.S.I van. An alleyway was taped off and cops were moving in and out. Morrigan couldn't see into the alleyway that well, too much was blocking her view.

Something died. Or well, someone. Morrigan stomach knotted, hoping it wasn't Marco. She jumped out of the car and bounced over, ducking under the tape and advancing to Luke and Lola's backs that were blockading the scene.

“Hey, guys!” Morrigan greeted loudly as she threw her arms around their shoulders making Lola scream and dive away, and made Luke step away from her quickly. Now, able to see the scene Morrigan was relieved to see the body wasn't Marco, it was Lefty.

“Morrigan what are you doing here?” Luke asked. “Did you follow us here?”

“I was just in the area…” Morrigan trailed off as she studied the body, his head shot out and the bloody mess left on the wall behind him, “Hey! I know this guy!” Morrigan said cheerfully.

“You do?” Lola asked, interest creeping into her voice.

“It's Lefty!”

Luke turned away from the scene, un-scrunching his nose and gaping at Morrigan. “Is it? Are you absolutely sure?”

“I mean it's hard to forget a face when you're being shot at,” Morrigan waved a hand. “Plus, you know I never, ever, forget,”

“You were shot?” Lola asked.

“Hey, look a wallet!” Morrigan quickly changed the subject so Luke wouldn't get mad again for her for being shot at. “Someone get it! Get it! Get it! Get it!”

One of the cops gave in to Morrigan's begging and grabbed the wallet that had fallen out of Lefty’s pocket, handing it to a gloved Lola who looked at Morrigan displeasingly. She opened it up.

“It looks like his real name is Samuel Castrona,” Lola said. Morrigan's eyes darted over the contents in the wallet, a driver's license, a business card for a construction company and two dollars in cash.

“His real name isn't Lefty?” Morrigan said in shock. Everyone gave her a disapproving look this time. “Who would've guessed.”

“He's a contractor, construction,” Lola continued reading the contents in the wallet. “Castrona Construction.” That's all they needed to see, Lola discarded the wallet to an evidence bag and went over to do her pathologists stuff leaving Morrigan standing beside Luke. She turned and smiled at him.

“So how bout them Mets?” Morrigan said. Luke rolled his eyes and ignored Morrigan, not wanting to talk to her. Morrigan frowned and turned back to Lola who stepped back from the body.

“It looks like he was killed early in the morning,” Lola said. “I can't believe Walker really had a partner. I would've never guessed.”

“You too, Lola?” Morrigan whined. “And he had two partners. Two.” Morrigan held up two fingers, Lola rolled her eyes.

“It's starting to look a lot like Marco is tying up loose ends.” Luke looked down at the body and squinted. “If this really is who you say it is…”

“I disagree, Marco didn't kill this man,” Morrigan said.

Luke sighed and looked at her. “Why?” He asked.

“Marco didn't have any bullets in his gun, how do you shoot someone without bullets? It just doesn't work.”

“What do you mean Marco didn't have any bullets in his gun?” Luke demanded.

“Did I forget to tell you that? I think you were too busy knocking the wind out of me for me to get a word in,”

“What?” Lola asked. Both Morrigan and Luke ignored her.

“He shot out the light,” Luke said.

“With his last bullet! And from that moment on he had the safety on his gun.”

“He could have more bullets!”

“I don't think so,” Morrigan said. “I truly believe that Marco isn't a killer. Someone else killed this man.”

“Then who?” Luke asked. Morrigan opened her mouth and raised a finger but closed it in a second, unable to come up with anything. Luke looked at her with fake expectancy. “Well?”

Morrigan looked down at Lefty's body and studied it quickly. The only things Morrigan noticed was that Lefty looked like he got into a fight, his shirt was ripped and there looked to be scratches on his wrist. And of course, his head was blown out. “Jason... Bourne…” Morrigan settled on, giving a proud smile to the cops around her, showing off her amazing detective work.

“Jason Bourne killed this man.” Luke deadpanned, not even pretending to care what Morrigan had to say anymore.

“Could you give me a second?” Morrigan raised a finger and backed away from the scene. She was obviously at a dead end here. Once out of earshot from Luke and Lola, she pulled out her phone and closed her eyes to recall the number she was looking for. Once in her brain, she dialed. Holding it up to her ear she silently prayed for them to pick up. After a few rings the line picked up and a cautious voice spoke up saying “...Hello?” Morrigan smiled,

“Hey, Marco!” Morrigan said.

“Morrigan?! How did you get this number?” Marco asked in shock.

Morrigan ignored him and continued on. “The one and only! Short Line Bridge. Be there.”

“What? Why?”

“I know you've been lying to me, I think we need to have a little talk.”

“I'm kind of in the middle of something…”

“You have 40 minutes.” Morrigan hung up. She hoped that worked.

“Who was that?”

Morrigan turned around to see Luke looking at her blankly.

“Yin,” Morrigan lied. “Consulting him about Jason Bourne. He says that's a negative for a murder suspect.”

Luke’s face looked anything like he believed her. Morrigan smiled.

“I'm going to- uh- go. I have a thing.” Morrigan started to back away from Luke and towards the direction of her car.

“A thing with Yin?” Luke asked.

“A thing by myself… Self-care...” Morrigan lied, again, knowing that if she said that she was going to be with anyone Luke would go ask them if she was with them. She had made that mistake way too many times before. Luke watched her as she backed up, still not believing her but didn't say anything further. Morrigan took this chance and turned and dipped back to her car.

“See ya, Luke!” She called out as she sped away, waving out her car as Luke walked back to the crime scene.

  
________________________

  
Marco waited in a hoodie on the far end of the Short Line Bridge looking up and down for Morrigan. Fun fact: He was currently on the bridge illegally, as due to the arson incident the city had put up fences and fines to stop people from going on the bridge. The railroad was long since abandoned (the city always talked about fixing it but come on, were they really?). Marco pinched the bridge of his nose, thinking that's probably something Morrigan would say.

After a few more minutes of pacing and looking out into the icy blue water, he noticed a fairly particular figure emerge onto the bridge, her dark skin and red hair standing out against the grey sky. Morrigan stopped at the other in of the bridge for a brief moment, staring at Marco. She cocked her head to the side and walked up.

“What do you want?” Marco asked. “This better not be a setup.”

“If you thought it was a setup you would have never come,” Morrigan said in an icy tone.

“Woah!!” Marco held up his hands at Morrigan's sudden hostile tone. “What's wrong?”

Morrigan stepped closer to him. Her demeanor was wildly different than what Marco was used too, causing him to step back. Her golden-eyed stabbed into his skin like needles.

Morrigan shifted her weight. “Did you ever catch up to Lefty?” She asked in a low, mocking tone.

Marco gulped. “I- No, I didn't. He got away before I could catch him,”

“Why would you need to catch him?” Morrigan asked. “Is there something you're not telling me?”

“No... There's nothing!” A blackbird cried out making Marco jump and spin around to see it sitting on one of the dead twisted trees, watching the two with dark eyes. When Marco turned back around Morrigan was closer, by a few inches.

Marco held up his hands as Morrigan advanced closer. “Don't act dumb,” Morrigan growled. A dim light on the bridge hummed with static. “I think it has to deal with the fact his brains were splattered onto a brick wall in an alleyway.”

Marco was getting closer and closer to the edge of the bridge with each step. There was a concrete barrier, but it would be oh so easy to be pushed off into the icy water below.

“He's dead?” Marco tried to back up more, but couldn't. One more step and he would be forgotten in the bubbling waters below. Morrigan grinned evilly, her golden eyes bore into Marco's like a rotating planet of gold.

“I'll ask you this once: Did you kill him?” Morrigan asked calmly.

Marco shook his head frantically. “No! I didn't why would I kill someone when I'm trying to clear my name of murder!?”

“ _Because you have nothing more to lose_?” Morrigan repeated Marcos's words. “I remember everything. You've lost everything, maybe it was time to just clean up loose ends.” Marco’s eyes widened. Morrigan grinned evilly, shadows crawling up her face on their own. “Don't lie to me Marco~,” Morrigan said in a low sing-song voice.

Marco’s heart shifted in his chest. Static tore at the corners of his eyes, the sky seemed to move faster than it had before. With every glance into the shivering golden eyes that stared Marco down, his blood got colder and colder. Fear swirled around him like an electric storm.

“Morrigan...”

“You know I don't have to solve your case for you, right? I could just end this whole thing right now. I asked you to be honest, and I know you're lying.” Morrigan said.

“I'm not!” Marco insisted.

Morrigan gave faux-apologetic smile. “I'm sorry, Marco. But you can't fool me.” Morrigan took one more step towards Marco and he was immediately hit with a burning in his chest, like thousands upon thousands of needles stabbing him. Morrigan smiled, and shadows cast around Marco. His heart pounded harder as he felt his spirit slip between his bones. Something was terribly wrong.

“Wait!” Marco said in a panic, trying to stop whatever was happening to him, “I was looking for this stolen necklace! You don't understand I need to find it! I have to save the club!” Morrigan paused and thought for a moment. Finally, she pulled back and the pain was lifted from Marco’s chest. He found himself falling to the ground, up against the wall, gasping for breath.

“What… What _was_ that?” Marco gasped out. “What did you…” Marco looked up at Morrigan who towered over him, eyes glowing. He gulped again, waiting for what would happen next.

Morrigan sat herself down beside him.

Marco gave her a wary look, Morrigan returned it with a sweet smile. “See! I knew there was something you were keeping from me!”

Macro stared at her wide-eyed. “You… You did all of that just to get information out me?”

“How else? Now that I know, you have to tell me. Scouts honor.” Morrigan held up three fingers clasped tightly together.

Marco deflated. “The club is going under, they don't have any money and I need to help them. If I was able to get the necklace back, I could save them! They are my last friends on this earth that trust me and believe me to be innocent! This merch is my last chance!”

Morrigan blinked, she remembered Marco mentioning it once at the bar. She tapped her chin in thought for a few seconds leaving Marco to stand in pleading fear, rubbing his clammy hands together. Morrigan's eyes shot up to watch a flock of birds fly by on the grey sky. She blinked slowly and let her head lazily fall back to look at Marco still shivering in fear. Marco could swear the glint present in her eyes was enjoyment. Enjoyment of his fear of her. Marco gulped. Morrigan's face sprung into a smile and slapped a hand onto his shoulder making Marco jump.

“The Feds think you murdered Lefty, but I didn't doubt you for one second!” Morrigan said happily. Marco let out a breath he didn’t remember holding.

“You didn't?! It felt like you were about to kill me just now!” Marco held a hand up to his chest, trying to shake away the fear. “Why would you even think I killed him?

“I just told you I didn’t ever doubt you. Con-men only tell the truth to save their life!” Morrigan raised a finger in a matter of fact. Morrigan jumped up and extend a hand to Marco. He warily took it and Morrigan pulled him to his feet.

“So you were going to kill me?!” He asked.

“What are you going to do report me to the Feds like you did with your partners?” Morrigan said tauntingly.

Marco closed his mouth and watched Morrigan carefully. She looked way more relaxed now, hands in her pockets and lazily leaning up against the wall. But he could still see a subtle, crazed glint in her eyes.

Marco deflated. “I'm sorry, I didn't want to tell you. I just felt it would make me look bad if I said I was searching for it as well.”

Morrigan flattened her lips and nodded. “A necklace, huh… So that's what you were searching for back at the warehouse?”

“Well, I was looking for traces to where they might have gone with the necklace, who they sold it to? I bet if I could find the necklace I would be able to find Lefty and Jon,” Marco said. “Or well I guess we already found Lefty…”

“What was the necklace?” Morrigan asked.

“It was called the Oceans Eye, a blue sapphire, really expensive and a lot of people on the black market had their eyes on it.” Marco said.

Morrigan pursed her lips again and nodded like she was thinking. The necklace in her pocket suddenly felt very heavy.

“It went missing?” Morrigan questioned, really just thinking allowed.

“Yes, all I heard was that Jon swiped it and skipped!” Marco said. “No one knows where it is, I think Jon stole it and set us up to take the fall!”

“Why didn't you tell the F.B.I this?”

“Oh come on what was I going to say?! Hey F.B.I! I know already think my partners are fake but they also stole this million-dollar necklace and now are completely gone! What?!”

“Ok you're right, I don't think they fair well with that,” Morrigan said. “Luke doesn't even believe me when I say I've seen every cop movie in existence,”

“Have you?”

Morrigan ignored him. “How did you learn about the jewel in the first place?” she asked.

Marco rubbed his face. “Lefty just said he had an inside source and he knew when the jewel would be in…” Marco said. “I know for sure is that it resurfaced and if I can get it back I can get some money for the club and they won’t have to go out of business!”

“So your top priority is the club? I think you're the most honorable criminal I've ever met.”

“I never wanted to hurt anyone, I just wanted to be able to live. That's kinda hard to do when you don't have any money…” Marco said. “I never expected to get roped up in all of this! I just wanted my friends to be alright.”

Morrigan frowned and looked down at her feet, scuffing her shoes along the wooden bridge. “Yeah, I know how you feel...”

“I know it's a lot to ask, but I really need to find this necklace. If I don't get it back then all of this would have been for nothing!” Marco pleaded. “Just give me a little more time, I really have to get it back!”

“The real jewel?” Morrigan asked.

“Yes, the real jewel? What other jewel would it be?”

Morrigan shrugged and didn't say much more, leaving Marco in uncomfortable silence. “I won't tell Luke right now… I can get in trouble too, you know. We’re on this bridge illegally, ever since the arson incident it's been off-limits.”

Marco scoffed. “I figured you'd say something like that.”

Morrigan abruptly stood up, and turned away and started to walk off the bridge. Marco looked around in confusion and huffed, jumping up as well.

“What were you going to do to me?” Marco called out in an unsure voice, trying one more time to get Morrigan to confess. Morrigan looked back at him, her face was completely wiped of that pure evil one he experienced earlier, back to its usual relaxed smile. Morrigan cocked her head.

“I don't know what you're talking about,” Morrigan said. Her smile fell for a second. “I would never hurt anyone.” she lied.

Marco shivered and Morrigan smiled again.

“I have to be going, good luck finding that necklace.” Morrigan in a taunting manner as she turned away.

Marco was left alone on the bridge with only the blackbird sitting the tree and reminiscence of fear slipping away from his chest.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan knew better than this. In fact, she felt guilty for doing this. But the F.B.I refused to tell her all the case info so here she was, sneaking into the field room to pull out the old and original, Family Jewel file. This was the last time, for sure. Morrigan glanced around the corner of the hall to make sure no one was in her way. She began to tiptoe down to the file room and scanned the key card that maybe she swiped off of a rookie agent.

The file room was dusty and as dim as ever. Faded boxes of manilla files wore with use filled the room row by row. Looking for the right row and letter, Morrigan was easily able to find the Family Jewel's file. She eagerly pulled it out of the box she sat down on the floor and opened it up.

_Murder of the Family Jewel._

_April 12, 2015. A man identified as Marco Walker, a 29-year-old man with no criminal record, was arrested in connection to the double murder of Mary and Robert Jewel. Due to the loud presentation of the job, Walker was caught by the daughter, Rosie Jewel; she used a vase to knock Walker out. Three gunshot wounds were found on Mary while there were two on Robert. Walker insisted there were partners who killed them, but no evidence of them was found to corroborate this. The shipment suspected of the robbery was safely returned to The Family Jewel._

Wait, the necklace wasn’t reported stolen? Then what was Morrigan holding in her pocket right now? Morrigan frowned.

_Rosie Jewel's testimony places Walker at the scene of the crime, and the one to murder her parents. She testified that the only person who was in the shop was Walker, no sign of any partners._

Morrigan frowned. She began scanning the pages in a second and retaining the information for later. The rest of the file contained notes on The Family Jewel's security system, the jewels they had imported, their construction record, they had a wall replaced awhile back...

Morrigan's head cocked to the side in interest but didn't get far with her thoughts as her ringing phone interrupted it. She shoves the file back into the box, already guessing who it was.

“Star here.”

“Hey, Morrigan-”

“Hi, Luke! What's poppin?” Morrigan smiled.

“Why did I just get word that someone matching your description was tiptoeing around the F.B.I offices and sneaking down to the records office?”

“Um, look alike, I don't know what's gotten into you,” Morrigan said. Morrigan heard a tired sigh on the other end of the line.

“The body from the warehouse was just delivered to the lab. They need someone to look at it.”

“Really? I get to work on the case?!” Morrigan said excitedly.

“No. You're going to give basic information to Lola and then go home.”

“But-”

“No.” Luke hung up. Morrigan sighed and dropped her arm down limply. She sat for a few more seconds and stared at the dusty box of files. She bit her lip and chewed for a few seconds before getting back up and leaving.

Morrigan unceremoniously left the records room and trudged her way back down the hall. She approached one of the F.B.I agents and threw the stolen (borrowed) badge on the ground. Morrigan tapped one of her long nails onto his shoulder, making him spin around in shock.

“You dropped that,” Morrigan dryly said, pointing to the badge on the ground.

“Oh! Thank you!” The agent said blushing, Morrigan walked off before the conversation could go anywhere.

Morrigan was about to leave the bullpen completely, but an unattended whiteboard with information about Marco Walker caught her attention. Morrigan looked left. No Luke, no Nimah. She looked right, no Nora no Jessica. Morrigan shoved her hands into her pocket and ran her thumb over the necklace as she walked over to the board.

Her eyes darted all over it, a picture of Marco’s mugshot (he still looked amazing), Rosie Jewel’s statement, evidence, and Marco's statement.

Morrigan took a second to read what Marco said in whole the night he was arrested.

 _MILLER: You say you had partners, am I correct?_  
_WALKER: Yes, Lefty and Jon, they’re local thugs. You should be able to find them, they had to be the ones to kill those parents._  
_MILLER: We didn’t find any evidence that there were two others working with you._  
_WALKER: What? That’s not possible?_  
_MILLER: Rosie Jewel’s statement was that you were the only one there._  
_WALKER: It’s her word over mine?_  
_MILLER: At the moment, yes._

“Whatcha doing?”

Morrigan spun around to see Nimah Rose standing behind her.

“Uh…” Morrigan drew a blank, it was pretty obvious what she was doing. “What are YOU doing?”

“Why are still here?” Nimah asked.

“I was just…” Morrigan deflated and gave up her excuse. “I just wanted to know a little bit about the case… I know Marco's side so I wanted to learn the F.B.I’s.”

“You know Walker is suspected for about ten other crimes too, right?” Nimah said. “We had been chasing him all over in connection to numerous jewel heists.”

“So?” Morrigan said in frustration. “He didn't kill anyone and that's what I'm trying to prove.”

“Is this really how you should be spending your time? Shouldn’t you be examining the skeleton that just came into the lab?” Nimah put her hands on her hips.

Morrigan looked back at the board of information, eyes darting up and down on it. Morrigan sighed. “I guess…”

  
________________________

  
After much dilly-dallying, one vending machine snack later, and examination later, Morrigan sat pouting at the bone table, looking at the skeleton they just extracted from the wall. It laid out neatly in front of her, still and silent, it smelt of musk and drywall. Morrigan had the skull turned to face her, staring back into the black cavities that were once eyes.

She’ll admit it, maybe she stayed a little longer than she should have. She didn’t want to go home, something about that idea seemed so boring. So she longingly ran a gloved finger over the socket and traced the cracks radiating over the cranium.

Morrigan occupied herself by examining the bullet hole in the man's head, over and over again. At this point, her mind was somewhere else and her eyes stared blankly at the single window to the outside world, slowly dripping further and further into darkness.

While mindlessly tracing the features of the skeleton, her glove kept getting caught on something on the nasal bone. After the fifth time, she gave in and looked for the culprit.

It was a perfect hole. It went through and through. It looked like a nose ring or something. Or maybe a really small bullet, or a worm ate directly through his nose in a perfect line, almost like a machine… Yeah….

It was most likely a piercing. Morrigan shook her head, she was losing her mind with nothing to do. You'd think people would graciously take the day off, but when it came to Morrigan, it was impossible to even get her out of the lab. Even when there was nothing to do and everyone else was doing important work and you’re just left to took at piercings in three-year-old bones!

Morrigan blinked in realization thinking back to the description Marco gave about Jon

“ _Wore a nose ring straight through the bone,”_ Morrigan squinted. Coincidence? “ _He also had a huge scar on his left arm after it was almost cut off from crawling under a car to escape the police._ ”

Morrigan looked over to the forearm and examined closely. The bone had reminiscence of a scar, as if something scratched there. Morrigan pulled back and pulled out the necklace she found from the body.

“Jon?” Morrigan puzzled. The ghost of paranoia in her chest made her immediately shoved the necklace back into her pocket. Her head shot up to see Nozomi Glass, the fifteen-year-old forensic assistant, standing at the other end of the table looking at her. Her wide, crazy, red eyes blinked innocently against her white skin. Morrigan narrowed her eyes at her. “You know I hate it when you do that, right?”

“Do what?” Nozomi asked innocently. “Who’s Jon?”

“Jon… Arbuckle…” Morrigan said offhandedly, mentally kicked herself.

Nozomi furrowed her eyebrows. “From Garfield?”

“Uh… Yes?” Morrigan said unsurely. Nozomi puckered her lips but left the subject.

“You wanna see the bullet we extracted from that guy’s body? It's, like, in perfect shape!” She giggled and raised the tray she was holding up just a little higher.

Morrigan sighed. Well, she had nothing better to do. “Sure, why not?” she shrugged.

Nozomi smiled and placed the tray on the nearby desk, placing the bullet under a microscope. “Just imagine being shot with a .45… The damage it can do to your body... It's.. magnificent…” Nozomi‘s hand twitched in excitement.

Morrigan bit the inside of her cheek and walked over to look down into the microscope. “A .45 you say?”

“Yeah!” Nozomi said. “Shot once in the head. Bap!” Nozomi made a shoot motion at her own head in a cutesy manner.

“Didn't Lola say Lefty was shot with a .45 too?”

Nozomi didn't wait a beat before nodding slowly and thoughtfully. “Ah, that means Marco murdered this man too and put him into a wall.”

“What? No that's not possible Marco uses a .10.” Morrigan said. “Plus, I think you would need contracting experience to put someone in a wall.”

“These kids at my school put themselves in a wall, it was a senior prank,” Nozomi said. “And dontcha know people can have more than one gun? I have more than one knife.”

“Yeah, but criminals are very particular about their guns, you know? It's like The Swordfish Killer, remember him? He was so specific about his knives that we eventually caught him because of it.” Morrigan waved her hand. “It’s like their brand to kill someone with their favorite weapon. You have a favorite knife right?”

Nozomi thought for a second about her rainbow switchblade. “Yeah, I guess I do.” She said. “So if Marco didn’t kill Lefty and Jon Arbuckle, who did?”

“Well…” Morrigan ran her tongue over her teeth and squinted her eyes. “I’m maybe at 54% with this theory, but the ride to the F.B.I offices will be enough for me to figure it out so I can tell Luke,” Morrigan said.

“It's right across the street? It's a four-minute walk?”

Morrigan ignored her and grabbed the girl by the shoulders. “Thank you for your help! You're a genius, Nozomi!”

“Thanks, I get called that a lot.”

“What a genius?”

“No, Nozomi.”

“Ah, a _Spongebob_ reference...” Morrigan smiled and turned away and ran off. “Thanks, Nozomi!” Nozomi waved happily as Morrigan dashed out the door.

Morrigan bounced her way into the lab’s main offices and advanced to leave. Bright red hair caught her eye. Morrigan stopped. A beautiful young woman was standing by one of the desks, looking over herself in her little hand mirror. She had expensive clothing on, Morrigan was sure of that. Morrigan cocked her head to the side and went over to her.

“Can I help you?” Morrigan asked.

The woman turned to her and in an instant, Morrigan recognized her as Rosie Jewel. Rosie looked her up and down judgingly, she had a scowl on her face. Morrigan had to admit she wasn't at her best, falling out of a car, getting into a fistfight with your best friend and immediately going back to work did that to you.

Rosie flipped her hair over her shoulder. “I'm just waiting for Officer Miller,” she said. “I don't need your help,”

“Agent,” Morrigan corrected. “What business do you have here at the lab though, shouldn't you be at the F.B.I offices?”

Rosie didn't look back at Morrigan as she kept messing with her appearance in her mirror. “Believe me I would rather be anywhere but here,” Rosie looked around at the labs 10 broken lights judgingly. “What's it to you?”

“I'm the one in charge of the case,” Morrigan lied. She looked Rosie up and down, she seemed to care greatly about her appearance but had four nails on her right hand either chipped or torn off. All that money and she still couldn't get a fill-in. Morrigan frowned. “I can help you with anything you need.”

“Oh, well,” Rosie started. “I'm just waiting so I can look at this dead body I'm supposed to identify,”

“Oh you mean Sandal Carpenter,” Morrigan said.

“Samuel.” Rosie corrected, not even moving her eyes from her broken manicure. Rosie's eyes shot over to Morrigan for a quick second, watching her. Morrigan gave a big smile and Rosie rolled her eyes, turning back towards her mirror.

“I'm just waiting for Luke,” Rosie said simply as she messed with her eyelashes.

Morrigan cringed at the use of Luke's name. She wanted to ask more before right before her, Rosie changed into a completely different person. Her scowl left her face and twisted into a worried expression, she straightened up and flipped her hair.

“Agent Miller!” Rosie called, her voice raised an octave Morrigan noted. Morrigan turned around to see Luke walking in. Rosie tapped over to Luke in her red stiletto heels and threw herself around Lukes’ neck. “Thank God you're here! I'm so freaked out!”

“There's no need to be scared Miss Jewel,” Luke said as he awkwardly patted her back “There are agents all around.”

Morrigan watched with wonder as Rosie kept talking about how scary the situation was, completely ignoring everything else around her-- as if it didn't exist. Luke looked over to see Morrigan standing there with a smile. Luke sighed and removed Rosie from his neck.

“What are you doing here?” Luke asked. “Didn't I tell you to give basic information and head home?”

“I wanted to stay and hang out with the wall body!” Morrigan said. Rosie glared at her as she came up behind Luke and latched onto his arm.

“Let's head down to the morgue, I just want this to be over with,” Rosie said.

“It’ll be alright, I'll stay with you the whole time,” Luke said reassuring a pouting Rosie.

“And me, too!” Morrigan spoke up. Rosie turned and glared at her, but otherwise didn't say anything. “You need someone to key you in, I'll do that.”

“Lola gave me a card-”

“No time for that, Luke! We gotta go!” Morrigan turned and started to lead them towards the morgue. Luke gave in and followed her. The three walked down to the lab in silence, particularly annoying Morrigan. Rosie still clung to Lukes side the whole way to the cold room.

Morrigan swiped her card and pushed open the two grey doors and presented the brightly lit room to the two. “Welcome to the morgue!”

Both Rosie and Luke looked displeased with Morrigan.

“Right over here.” Luke lead her to the body draped in the white sheet. Morrigan positioned herself opposite side to them, slowly she pulled back the white sheet.

Morrigan watched Rosie closely, she sucked in a breath and gripped her purse strap.

“I've never seen this man before,” Rosie said, shaking her head.

“Are you absolutely sure?” Luke asked. “He never worked for you on a job, or something of the such?”

“No, he's unfamiliar to me,” Rosie said with a straight face. Luke sighed. “I can't believe that psycho Marco would do something as cruel as this!”

“Are you sure, though?” Morrigan asked again. Rosie's eye twitched.

“Yes, I'm sure,” Rosie said in annoyance and turning to Luke. “What's she even doing here?”

“I'm here asking if you are absolutely sure you’ve never seen this man before,” Morrigan said, drawing out her statement as if she were talking to a child.

“Yes!” Rosie said.

“Morrigan,” Luke warned. Morrigan blinked and pretended she didn't hear him. Luke came around the table and pulled Morrigan away from Rosie. “Go home, seriously you're addicted to work and nosing your way into things,” Luke said. Rosie who stared at her with distaste from by the body. “What is wrong with you?”

“Um,” Morrigan raised a finger and pointed at Lefty. “I've been telling you, Marco didn't kill that man.”

“I need solid proof, Morrigan. Your word only doesn't hold up in court.” Luke said.

“Look, he used his last bullet in the abandoned garage, and I looked in the glove box, there weren't any bullets. He couldn't have shot anyone,” Morrigan pointed out. “Plus Marco uses a .10mm. Lefty was killed with a .45mm. Seriously look at the signs, Luke!”

“What were you doing in his glove box?”

“I get curious.” Morrigan defended.

“I'm not doing this right now Morrigan. Go home, we don't need your help.” Luke groaned.

“But everyone loves my company!”

“I know you're not going to listen to me but,” Luke sighed and looked at her with sad eyes. “Go anywhere but the F.B.I or Yang Institutions. Maybe a therapist.”

Morrigan frowned as Luke turned away and headed back to Rosie who was looking at her smugly. “I'll have you know I'm perfectly stable for someone my age!” Morrigan called out as Luke lead Rosie out of the morgue. Morrigan frowned and scuffed the tile under her shoes. “See a therapist… Yeah sure…”

  
________________________

  
Luke was right, Morrigan didn't go anywhere but the F.B.I or Yang Institutions.

Morrigan sat outside of the F.B.Is building surrounded by cold air. The leaves were thick with winter rain, and the last of the light was falling behind the building. She didn't bother to go back to her own house, she didn't want too, and she doubts Luke would let her into the lab or F.B.I building. So she sat in the chilly air waiting for Yin to get off of work so she could tag along to his house.

She had been working out the case in her head for a bit, I mean, she was too deep in it now to stop trying to solve it. She had been so busy blanking out she hadn't noticed there had been some sort of commotion, lots of cars and vans were circling around the F.B.I building, as if they were getting ready for something. Morrigan shook off her thoughts and started to watch the building. She started to tap her foot.

_What was going on?_

At the first SWAT van to pull up, Morrigan made her decision to dash into the building. Reaching the bullpen after four flights of stairs, Morrigan realized something big was going on, people were rushing from place to place decked out in gear.

“Morrigan?!”

Morrigan looked over to see Luke looking at her with bewilderment, he had on the F.B.I bulletproof vest. Morrigan gave a smile and walked over with open arms. “Lukey! Has anyone ever told you that you’re extremely sexy when you’re about to go on a raid?”

Luke ignored her comment and continued to grab things. “I thought I told you to stay home, Morrigan!” Luke cried. “You really make this difficult.”

Morrigan grabbed one of the riot helmets and put it on. “Can I have this one? I think it'll look really cool on my desk.”

Luke snatched the helmet off of Morrigan to reveal her grinning face. “No you cannot have it,” he snapped. “We’re kinda busy if you hadn't noticed.”

Morrigan took a look around the room with a wall of riot gear. She watched agents brush by her with heavy weapons. “Yeah… What's going on?”

Luke started to gather up his things and get ready to dash out along with the other agents. “We got Walker cornered! We were supposed to be out of here five minutes ago!”

“I can reverse time for you if you want,” Morrigan said.

“Stay here!”

That was the last thing Morrigan could get out of Luke before he dashed off. The office became increasingly quieter with agents leaving. Morrigan looked down at one of the rubber bullet guns left on the table. She picked it up and looked over to one of the only techs in the front room.

“Can I have this?” Morrigan said.

“I… I don't think so…”

Morrigan frowned and dropped the gun. She made a split-second decision and dashed off after them. She reached outside just as one of the vans sped off. Morrigan followed the remaining agents out who ignored her and didn't even bother to tell her to stop. She watched as they each jumped into their respective vans and sped off.

“Damn!” Morrigan cursed, Making another split (and bad) decision and went straight for Luke's car again.

She followed them the best she could, trying to look inconspicuously following a SWAT van. But if she learned anything from _Burn Notice_ , it was how to tail perfectly. She pulled over just as the van made a turn down a one-way street.

Morrigan stepped out of the car and peaked down the ally way. It lead to an old hotel still standing around all the construction. Morrigan sniffed and stepped into the ally.

She made her way down the twisting road and to the front parking lot. She watched as Luke and the teams jumped out in heavy gear and guns, ready to take Macro down. Morrigan started to tap her foot and bounced up and down, she was getting impatient.

She groaned and gave in, dashing up to the agents.

“Boo!” She greeted, which wasn't a good idea, all the agents turned to her with their guns trained on her. At least ten red dots played on Morrigan's forehead. “Whoops,”

“Morrigan!” Luke barked. “What's wrong with you?!”

“I'm just kinda shocked that you suggested I see a therapist, I mean, just wow. Do you really think I'm that messed up? If I wanted to talk to a psychologist I would've greeted Nora.” Morrigan said, grinning widely. A few of the agents chuckled at Morrigan, who just grinned brighter.

“Don't distract me and don’t encourage her!” He snapped at the team.

“What with all this heavy duty stuff, you're acting like Marco's some kind of dangerous fugitive,” Morrigan said.

Luke grumbled. “Stay out of the way, we have to go in now!” He made a hand signal that the other agents followed, heading towards the room.

Morrigan stood outside as she watched the agents silently make their way up to Marco's room and give their hand signals. Morrigan started to fidget with the necklace in the pocket as she heard Luke bellow out F.B.I and break down the doors. The rest of it went too fast from Morrigan to really care. Marco was being pulled out of the room. Luke looking proud he had finally caught him, and Marco looking… defeated.

Luke personally cuffed him and pulled him away from the room and dragged him to the van. Morrigan frowned as Marco noticed her and gave an apologetic look and mouthed ‘sorry.’ Luke shoved him into the back of one of the vans and shut the door. And that was that. That concluded it. It was all over.

At least for the agents.

It was now or never and even though Morrigan maybe had the case 79% worked out, she decided her best bet to put her plan into action was to disobey Luke one (and this time for sure) last time.

“Wait, Luke!” Morrigan grabbed Luke's shoulder and inconspicuously shoved her hand into his pocket, pickpocketing him. “I just want to say good job, I'm really proud of you.”

Luke gave her a weird look but ultimately smiled. “Thank you Morrigan,” and he walked away off.

Morrigan stepped into the modest hotel room, still crawling with a few agents. There was nothing in here. The hotel room was completely empty except for a plastic bag on one of the beds. There was a bunch of sour gummy candy and a phone.

Morrigan frowned, at least she got her stuff back. But there wasn't much time, if everything were to work out as she wanted it to, she was about to solve this case. She turned and left, leaving back to her (Luke's) car.

________________________

  
They had made it back to the offices and Luke was wholeheartedly satisfied. Everyone around seemed happy, congratulating Luke on his hard work. They had finally caught the man who killed two and kidnapped his best friend. All in just a few days, Luke felt accomplished. He stood with a smug look on his face, he couldn't help it, as Marco was cuffed to one of the desks in the interrogation rooms.

“Wait, man-” Marco started. As Luke stepped away and pocketed the key.

“Save it, man, you're not fooling us into another wild goose chase,” Luke said. “You're finally going back to jail with more crimes on your roster than you had before you broke out.”

“My phone-”

“What about your phone?” Luke said.

Marco's front pocket rang, well his phone in his front pocket. Luke looked at him suspiciously.

“You're going to want to get that, I assume,” Marco said. Luke gave a shocked look and cautiously walked over and took the phone out of his pocket. He wanted to close it off but froze at who the number calling.

It was his number.

Oh great. Luke was praying that what he thought was about to happen, would not happen. Luke flipped open the burner. “Hello?”

“ _Hey, Luke! How's it going?_ ” A cheerful, cool voice filled his ear.

Luke's eyes closed and gave a frustrated sigh. “Morrigan? Did you swipe my phone again?!”

Morrigan ignored him. “ _Guess what!_ ”

“Where are you?!” Luke said. “We've caught Walker, come back to the offices since you refuse to go home.”

“ _You have Marco? What interrogation room is he in?_ ” Morrigan asked.

“Four. Why are you calling me on this phone?” Luke said sharply.

 _“I solved the case, you guys didn't give me any time to tell you. You were practically running away, I'm not that bad am I?_ ” Morrigan said.

“Morrigan where are you?” Luke tried again.

“ _You've got the wrong guy, haven't you been paying attention?_ ” Morrigan drawled. “ _Hey! Have you ever seen Inside Man?_ ”

Luke closed his eyes in annoyance. “Is that another hostage movie?”

“ _Yeah, it is. Denzel Washington_.” Morrigan said.

“Did you just look up a list of hostage movies and hope to use some of them?” Luke asked in annoyance

There was a beat of silence before Morrigan answered. “ _Maybe I did, or maybe I've seen every single one of these movies,_ ” she said. “ _Meet me down at the Family Jewel_ ,”

“I'm not doing that!” Luke cried.

“ _You don't want to convict the wrong guy, do you?_ ” Morrigan said. Luke tried to ignore it, but his hair was starting to pick up on the back of his neck. It had been a recent occurrence since Morrigan became his partner, it was something he couldn't pinpoint. Something like… static. Morrigan's words echoed over and over on his head.

_You don't want to convict the wrong guy, do you?_

“ _You have ten minutes_ ,” Were Morrigan final words before the line went dead, leaving Luke standing in front of Walker who was watching him with a smug expression.

“Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere.” He said with a smirk, holding up his cuffed hands.

Luke groaned and turned away sharply, heading out the interrogation room door and slamming it shut. He once again was heading out on one of Morrigan's random conspiracies again.

  
________________________

  
Morrigan sat cross-legged on top of Luke's car, a heavy black van rolled up, pulling to a stop in front of Morrigan. She watched as Luke jumped out, relief filled her body. She would never tell Luke the percentage of the timing on her plan working. Which was something along the lines of 20%.

“Ok, what is it?” Luke asked, as he walked up to her with open arms full of annoyance. He stopped in his tracks and looked questionably at the car she was sitting on. “Is that my car?” Morrigan ignored him, only hoping the second part of her plan worked.

“Agent Miller?”

Morrigan fist-bumped in her head. _Rosie! Yes!_

Rosie Jewel cautiously walked up to the two, confusion playing on her face. She was clutching her handbag close to her chest. Morrigan smiled and rubbed her hands, standing up on top of the car.

“Morrigan! You're going to break my car!” Luke shouted.

“Ah, glad to see everyone could make it!” Morrigan clapped her hands together, ignoring Luke again.

“Morrigan what are we doing here?” Luke asked.

“Yes, I agree. What am I doing here?” Rosie said in annoyance.

“Isn't it obvious? I'm here to put away the killer of your parents once and for all.” Morrigan said dramatically.

“Really? You finally caught that psycho bastard?” Rosie said.

“Indeed we did, in fact, she's standing right in front of us.” Morrigan smiled.

Rosie's eyes widened for a split second but then she regained her posture and smoothed down her green tube dress. “That's ridiculous, who are you to accuse me?”

“I’m the detective who went through hell and fell out of a car moving 50 miles per hour-”

“Wasn't it more like 20?” Luke interjected.

“-And if I'm wrong, and I’m, like, 89% sure I'm not, My name is Nimah Rose. That's N-I-M-A-H-"

“Morrigan.” Luke cut her off sharply. “Just tell us what you have to say.” He may have had a scowl on his face, but Morrigan knew he was interested. She smiled.

“I'm going to be telling a story about a girl and a boy,” Morrigan closed her eyes and thought back to the files she read. “You met Lefty through a contracting job, your wall was being fixed. You picked him out as a thug and seduced him into working with you, after all, you knew the jewel business better than he did.”

Morrigan hopped off the car and pointed to the store. “You became close with Lefty and learned about his desires, he and Jon desperately wanting to get rid of their partner who was dragging them down so they would get more money between the two of them. And Lefty he learned about your desires, your desires to finally stop being the fragile daughter of two family jewelers and expand the business.”

Rosie tilted her head upwards and frowned. “You have such an active imagination. I'm sure the court will take you very seriously.” Rosie said, voice dripping with sarcasm.

Morrigan grinned widely. “Oh but I haven't gotten to the best part! The plan you formed. It was genius, really. You discovered you were getting the Oceans Eye in, You planned to steal your own gem and get rid of the things that were dragging you down. You planned to keep the use the jewel to get a payout as well as the life insurance from your parents,”

Morrigan stepped closer and eyed Rosie with her fierce golden eyes. Rosie stayed silent but her face said it all. “It was the perfect plan, you would get away with murder and Lefty and Jon would get away with theft because it was all going to be pinned on Marco.”

Rosie's eyes narrowed. “Are you seriously accusing me of killing my own parents? What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Well I've been told I need to see a therapist,” Morrigan said. “But here's where it all went wrong, Jon being the greedy bastard he is, tried to run with the necklace. You had planned to turn it in for the money but he had different ideas. You were enraged that he left you and Lefty and you tracked him back down to the warehouse. You confronted him and fought and you thought ‘Hey! I've already killed two people, what's one more?’” Morrigan made a shooting motion with her fingers towards Rosie, who was boiling over. “In the end, I guess it worked out pretty well. You got control of the shop, thousands in TV appearances, you were a star. Lefty got the payout he wanted so life was good. But there was only one problem: You were still missing that necklace. That necklace was your connection to the crime if you reported it stolen the police would know something was up. So you pretended you had it all this time when in reality, ya didn't.”

“I love my parents! I would never do anything like what you're suggesting.” Rosie growled.

“Yeah, sure. You forgot them the second they were in the ground. But please refrain from interrupting, this story is pretty complicated.” Morrigan picked at her nails for a brief moment. “Anyway, cut to three years later, a necklace shows up on the black market that looks suspiciously like the one stolen from you the night of the three murders,”

Rosie's eyes went wide.

“You three, Lefty, you and Marco, went crazy for it. After all, it was your necklace, you worked hard to get it. “ Morrigan tapped her head for effect. “It was the Oceans Eye for God's sake! Everyone wanted, in fact, you got into a fight with Lefty about it. In a fit of rage, you took your gun and shot him straight in the head! After all, two can keep a secret if one of them is dead,”

“You can't prove any of this!”

“I bet I could. You used the same gun to kill both Lefty and Jon and since Marco was already in jail when Jon was killed, I'm betting it was you who killed him. You fought with Lefty, scratching him and ripping his clothes. What kind of expensive woman like you would leave your nails unattended to, unless the had been broken the night before? And of course, the most damning piece of information, how were you able to correct Lefty's real name to Samuel when purposefully called him Sandal?”

Rosie froze, her eyes shook and clutched her bag so tight that her hands were turning paperwhite. Morrigan grinned and held out her arms.

“Ok, how did I do in like percentage out of a hundred, because I'm missing parts, I had to put this plan into action a little early,” Morrigan said smugly.

Rosie didn't miss a beat as she reached into her purse and stepped forward, pulling out a shiny .45mm gun. Rosie trained it directly at Morrigan. “You ruined everything! You meddling, idiotic, cocky douchebag!” Rosie yelled. “If it weren't for you I would be living my best life right now.”

Luke drew his gun and aimed it at Rosie. “Miss Jewel, I suggest you put down the weapon,”

“Well, I'm going to guess and say I scored pretty high. You know I bet that's the gun you used to kill all four of your victims.” Morrigan said as she calmly stared cross-eyed down the barrel of the gun.

“That bastard Lefty was trying to screw me over, he was trying to get that necklace before me! He was looking around for Macro without me and-” Rosie laughed. “I couldn't have that,”

“Seriously, we got you dead to rights you confessed, basically, and you're holding a gun in my face.” Morrigan started to back up.

“The only thing that's going to be dead is you,” Rosie growled.

Before Morrigan could throw off another snarky comment, the click of the gun echoed off of the empty parking lot, the loud bang made Morrigan flinch. A bullet slammed straight into her, shattering her clavicle and hitting a major artery. Morrigan stumbled over and the entire world went into slow motion. Rosie being tackled by Luke, and Morrigan doubling over trying to hide the extreme amount of blood pouring from her body.

The world came to an eerily stop, Luke, frozen in the air as he tacked Rosie, the shadows frozen in time, the color slowly seeping away from the world. The only moving thing was Morrigan, crouched down on the ground breathing heavily with the faint sound of unnerving static playing in her brain. The Calamity heaved as her body repaired itself quickly, blood disintegrating into black smoke, the wound of Rosie’s gun nonexistent.

Morrigan stumbled to her feet, rolling her shoulder where she was shot, looking at the frozen scene around her. She took a few seconds to regain her composure, the faint static starting to fade away. Morrigan swallowed, and time resumed at her command.

Rosie fell to the ground with a cry and Luke wrestled the gun away from her, handcuffing her despite her violent cries.

“Are you ok, Morrigan?!” Luke yelled turning to his partner who stood calmly watching the whole scene go down. Morrigan looked him in the eye and smiled.

“Yes, of course.” She smiled, Luke looked at her in confusion. Rosie was cuffed and on her way to head to the F.B.I offices. Morrigan felt accomplished, with the case now solved, only the faint sting in her shoulder left to bother her.

  
________________________

  
The offices seemed to at least have calmed down a bit, people still went on with their work. Except for Rosie Jewel, who was sitting in custody, as was Marco Walker. Morrigan stood behind the two way glass watching Nora and Nimah integrate a sobbing Rosie. Morrigan had to give her props for her fake crying, it was pretty convincing.

Morrigan bit the inside of her cheek as she watched the scene play out in front of her. The case was over. Morrigan told herself over and over again, but the knot in her stomach still didn't settle.

That feeling amplified when the door to the two-way glass room opened, Luke peered his head and blinked at Morrigan; who kept her eyes straight ahead. He silently walked up beside her and sighed.

“Hey...” He started.

“Hey,” Morrigan replied dryly, trying to ignore the heavy feeling in her throat that already began to form.

The two stood next to each other, only focusing on the scene playing out in the interrogation room. Morrigan's chest tightened with sadness as she tried to ignore the sick feeling settling in her stomach.

“I guess you were right, Marco didn't kill anyone.” Luke finally said. Morrigan shrugged.

“I knew that, I just spent two days trying to prove it,” Morrigan said. She still ignored Luke's presence, keeping her eyes focused ahead on Rosie Jewel, desperately trying to fight down the tears already trying to claw themselves out.

“I guess we’ll have to open an investigation for the necklace now, not looking forward to working with white-collar.” Luke said in a strained, joking manner.

Morrigan flattened her lips in shame. “Here, why don't I save you some trouble,” Morrigan said, reaching into her pocket and daintily pulled out The Oceans Eye. Luke gaped at her in shock. Morrigan swung her head to him and gave a toothy smile. “You mean this necklace?”

“You’ve got to be kidding me. There's no way you found it.” Luke said in shock.

“The one on the market right now is a forgery, looks like you don't have to work with white-collar for that,” Morrigan said.

Lukes face dropped into a scowl and swiped the necklace away from a grinning Morrigan and began inspecting it. “Where on earth did you find this?”

Morrigan shrugged. “Dumb luck on my part, Lefty and Rosie were just dumb and didn't check his pockets when they killed him.”

Luke looked back in disbelief again. “No way you found it in his pockets.”

“Actually it was on the floor, but I can only assume it must've fallen out of his pockets. I didn't want it to fall into the wrong hands, so I kept it,” Morrigan shrugged.

“And didn't tell us?” Luke asked. Morrigan went silent and looked down to her feet. Luke sighed and rubbed his forehead. “You shouldn't have done that.”

“It was only a necklace, it's not like I was going to steal it myself,” Morrigan said.

“I'm talking about running off without telling us all the facts,” Luke said.

“I had it all under control, I did it to solve the case. I know you're mad at me for sticking my neck out, but I swear I'll stop.”

“This isn't me mad at you solving the case,” Luke said. “This is me mad that you're lying to me. Again.”

“I don't get why this is such a huge deal.” Morrigan tried to wave off.

“Because there are laws, Morrigan!” Luke cried. “There's laws for a reason and you break and bend them to your liking like nothing applies to you! It's not how the world works!”

Morrigan pauses for a moment and ground her teeth. She spun and looked at Luke angrily. “What do you know about the world?” She growled. “You can't stand me around because I'm the one who looks further into things than you ever would. I'm the one who goes out on a limb to solve a case.”

“How does Yin put up with you?!” Luke shouted. “I can't believe someone who grew up with a father as a cop, thinks the best way to solve crimes is to lie your way through and use everyone around you.”

The reality hit Morrigan in the face like cold water. She froze. “I don't use you-”

“Just prove to me you're more than a con-man, a liar and a thief. Just for once in your life look me in the eye and tell me the truth.” Luke pleaded.

Morrigan looked directly into Luke's eyes with her cold gaze. She gulped in the presence of Luke’s pleading stare, begging for answers. Morrigan dropped her gaze to the floor. “I'm an entity as old as time, immortal to everything with powers beyond your imagination. I planted myself on Earth for fun.”

Luke smiled and deflated. “You just don't know when to quit with the jokes do you.”

“What is it that you want from me? I swear I’ll loop you in next time, that's what you want isn't it?” Morrigan asked, for the first time sounding vulnerable since the day she pranced her way into Luke’s life.

“I want you to stop lying.”

“It's not as simple as that Luke, You don't understand,” Morrigan pleaded. “I'm not doing this to protect myself, I’m doing this protect you!”

“Protect ME?” Luke said in shock. “I'm the agent here, it's my job to protect and serve. No offense, Morrigan, but you're a rich girl who weaves her way around life with charm. Protecting isn’t your job, you could've died today!”

“Marco wouldn't have killed me,”

“How can you be sure?! How can you be so sure that the man pointing a gun at you won't kill you?!”

“The same way I know that the man robbing the bank isn't all that bad! Human behavior is such a large spectrum that twists and turns and breaks boundaries with every person. You stay in such a straight line that you don't want to consider the idea that some crazy outlandish idea that maybe Marco isn't all that bad of a person!” Morrigan said.

“Whenever you get involved with cases it all just spirals out of control. How do you do it?” Luke jabbed accusingly. “I spent months tracking this guy and studying evidence to convict him, I was sure he was guilty. You spent four minutes with the guy and concluded that he was innocent!”

“Because you never look at the bigger picture...” Morrigan whispered.

Luke laughed bitterly. “What makes you believe that you're the most competent person to solve the F.B.I’s cases? You're a forensic anthropologist! Your job is to examine human bones! If you wanted to become a profiler you should’ve trained to be one, not run into situations blind with no sort of training.”

“I'm smarter than you think I am, Luke,” Morrigan growled, the one overhead light flickered for half a second. “I was taught how to read guilt off of someone at the age of six, how to pick a lock at seven, and how to manipulate people to get what I want by ten. By all means, I should be a business CEO like my mother-”

“So why aren't you?!” Luke screeched. “By all means, that would be safer and I wouldn't be practically losing hair worried over your safety!”

“I don't need you to worry about me!” Morrigan yelled. She tried to come up with something, anything, but was coming up blank. Morrigan was trillions of years old. She had seen civilizations fall all at her hand, she had manipulated people for her own fun. She was the one who people needed to be protected from.

“If you're so in control of everything around you, are really are a psychic and that’s how you solve all your cases?” Luke spat. “How much longer are you going to lie to us?”

“You don't understand!” Morrigan yelled, her eyes full of tears. “I’m not good at this! I never learned how to be sensitive! I have to lie to you because I can’t let you know who I really am!”

Luke froze. Morrigan gasped and held a hand to her mouth in shock at her outburst.

“Who… you really are?” Luke said. “What do you mean?”

“I don’t see things the same way you do, Luke…” Morrigan murmured, fighting off the urge to reverse time and retract her last statement.

“Morrigan…” Luke started, watching Morrigan carefully. “What do you mean?”

“I can’t… I can't tell you.” Morrigan said, looking down at her feet.

“And why the hell not?!” He took a step closer to her and jabbed a finger at her chest. “Why the hell can't you tell your best friend? You need to learn to own up to your actions, and take other people’s feelings into consideration for once.”

“Because if I tell you then everything changes! You won’t look at me the same way ever again, you won’t look at the world the same way ever again.” Morrigan, looking at Luke with pleading eyes.

“You know I really do trust you, Morrigan. I do know you’re smart,” Luke said. “Just once in a while, I just ask you to trust me. You can tell me anything, I promise I would never judge you. What are you hiding from me?”

“Luke…” Morrigan looked at him through her blurry eyes. “I will tell you. At some point. Not right now.”

“Is it bad?”

Morrigan looked down to her feet again, feeling the energy around her darken. She took a deep breath and released it, feeling static radiate off her. The light overhead flickered for a few seconds, making Luke slightly flinch; Morrigan ignored it and didn't take her eyes off the floor as tears ran down her face.

“I don't know…” Morrigan said, vulnerable. “I'm sorry.”

Luke sighed, watching Morrigan intently. He suddenly felt a wave of sadness, he had never seen her cry before. He carefully placed a hand on her shoulder. “I support you, ok? You’re one of the closest friends I’ve had in a while, and I do care about you. It kills me to think about you getting hurt.”

“I don't want to think about you getting hurt either...” Morrigan said. “I don't want to lose you, Luke.”

“I don't want to lose you either, Morrigan,” Luke said. “But I chose this life, I know what I'm getting myself into when I pick up a new case. It's my job to protect the people around me. It gets kind of hard when you throw yourself into the middle of things.”

“I know…” Morrigan murdered.

“So why do you do it?”

“I…” Morrigan trailed off. “I don't know… I really don't..” Morrigan tried to ignore the black energy screaming in her chest, closing her eyes and took another deep breath.

The two went silent. Morrigan tried to regain her cool composure, but her labored breathing made it difficult. Luke didn’t move from his spot, lifting his hand from her shoulder to brush away some hair stuck on Morrigan's face from her dried tears.

Morrigan smiled and relaxed some, falling into his touch. “Are you going to tell the Director? Turn me in for all those things you said in the parking lot?” Morrigan asked. Luke sighed and pulled her into a hug.

He shook his head. “I don’t want to, I don’t want to tell on my best friend. It would be wrong, but don’t test me Morrigan. I don’t want you to die so I will if I have too.”

Morrigan smiled, she yawned and wrapped her own slender arms around Luke. “So we’re still friends? After all that?”

“Yeah,” Luke chuckled. “Friends have fights sometimes, it’s the talking it out that keeps people friends. Just promise me you'll be safer in the future?”

“Luke, I promise you with my entire heart, that I will never die,” Morrigan said.

“Your confidence is comforting…” Luke said. “Almost…”

“You know I would never hurt you intentionally, Luke,” Morrigan said into his shoulder. “I hope you know that. You are one of the things that keeps me grounded in this world. I didn’t mean to attack you at the hospital like that, it was wrong.”

“It was my fault, I shouldn’t have hit you. I was all over the place.” Luke sighed. “I let my emotions get the better of me.

“I did too…” Morrigan whispered, not wanting to think about how close she came to killing him. In an attempt to lighten the mood again Morrigan added: “Friends punching each other in a hospital parking lot?” Sounds a lot like _Fight Club_ if you ask me.”

Luke smiled at Morrigan. “I think you’re obviously Tyler, you’re perfect for the role,” Luke said.

“That’s music to my ears, Luke,” Morrigan said. The cold air had almost disappeared, Morrigan let out another yawn and stepped away. “I guess it’s time for me to finally go home…I'll finish the files on Jon tomorrow.” Morrigan said, her eyes were heavy from both sleep and all the crying.

“Now that's not something I hear every day,” Luke said. Morrigan scoffed, making Luke smile. It quickly dropped and Luke looked her directly in the eyes. “Can I ask you a question?” Luke said.

Morrigan's heart jumped with dread, feeling the darkness in her chest tighten again. “Anytime, shoot.” Morrigan smiled.

“What did you mean by ‘ _If I fought back you'd be dead?_ ’” Luke asked.

Morrigan blood ran cold. _Yeah, I have the power to destroy entire planes of existence._ She opened her mouth and fished for a response as close to the truth as possible. “Uh, self-defense classes when I was younger. My mom made me train all the time.”

Luke smiled. He seemed at ease, but he still had a glint in his eye. Morrigan knew that meant he still had his suspicions, no way he was going to let go of the fact that Morrigan almost killed him. But even with Morrigan's three PhDs, she couldn’t tell if the truth would make the situation worse or not.

“I'll see you around Morrigan.” Luke turned towards the door. “Please get some rest now?”

“Will do partner!” Morrigan called out. “Can't wait till the next case!” Luke held up a hand in parting and left the room with a click.

Morrigan was alone again. She sighed and decided she had seen enough of Rosie yell details about the case, and left the room. Making a quick pit stop at a desk and grabbed a paper clip and head towards the other interrogation room. She peeked her head inside and smiled at Marco who sat sadly at the desk. He perked up at the sight of Morrigan.

“Hey! I didn't think I would get a chance to thank you,” Marco said as Morrigan stepped into the interrogation room.

Morrigan smiled. “For what?”

“Oh come on don't be modest,” Marco grinned. “You stuck to your word, you cleared me of murder and in turn caught the real murderer.”

“You’re welcome. You won't have to worry about those guys bothering you. Both Lefty and Jon are dead and Rosie's going to jail.” Morrigan said.

Marco looked at Morrigan for a moment, his eyes darting up and down her body. “Wow… I guess I never realized how much this case took it out of you…”

Morrigan chuckled softly, looking down at her tattered clothing. “That's partly your fault. You should've never thrown me out of a moving car.”

Marco laughed, looking down at the shiny metal table. “I guess everyone in my crew is gone, huh? Scary to think about, almost. I worked for them for so long, it feels… unreal.”

“Don't get too nostalgic, they set you up to take the fall of two murders so they could get a larger payout,” Morrigan said.

“Yeah, well, still. There's a lot of death associated with that crew, I almost feel bad for them,” Marco said. “Don’t you feel anything?”

“Not really,” Morrigan said. Marco gave an apologetic smile.

It was silent for a second before Marco broke it. “I guess we never found the necklace…”

“Pretty lucky you didn't find it. You would've run the second you discovered it.” Morrigan said.

“Would I?”

Morrigan smirked “You told me you wanted to clear your name, but that's not why you broke out. That necklace was your top priority. You thought you could use me,”

“I did not,” Marco said in shock. “Well- Maybe at first I thought I could, but then I realized you were way too smart for me to fool. The life-threatening was also off-putting.”

“I would have never killed you, Marco,” Morrigan lied. Marco gave her a doubting look, he shook his head and looked up at the dim light hanging above.

“That necklace was the only thing that could save the club,” Marco said. “I wonder what they're going to do now…”

“Don't worry, I'll make an anonymous donation to your club I'm already filthy rich.” Morrigan smiled.

“You will?!” Marcos face lit up.

“Yeah, I love Candy. She's wonderful.”

“Yeah, she is one of a kind… Thank you, Morrigan,” Marco laughed, leaning back on the chair with a smile. “I guess it's back to the slammer for me, at least not for murder this time. Thank you again for your help, Morrigan. You were the only one who believed me.”

Morrigan tossed the paper clip at him. “Don't make me regret this.”

It fell right in front of Marco's hands chained to the desk. Marco looked at it for a second before grabbing it suspiciously. “What the catch?”

“No catch.” Morrigan shrugged. She walked over and leaned over the desk and loomed over Marco as he worked the lock. “-But I'd hate to have to finish our conversation from the bridge.” Morrigan let the shadows creep around her again, the chilly air of the room became thick with fear.

The lock clicked and Marco stood up, rubbing his wrists. “You're really terrifying you know?” He looked at Morrigan and smiled sweetly, making her relax.

“I've been told that,”

“Why are you letting me go?” Marco asked.

Morrigan tapped her chin for a second. “I don't think you're a bad guy, Marco. You're definitely not the worst, in fact, I'm a worse person than you.”

“You don't think Agent Miller will suspect you for this?” Marco asked. Morrigan smiled sadly.

“I'm sure he will. Maybe I'll tell him the truth at some point. I don't know. I'm not sure he's ready right now.”

“Lying to him again, I see.”

“Sometimes it's for the best,” Morrigan said.

Marco started to head for the door, but stopped before he opened it. “You know, Lefty is known for his marksmanship, they say he could shoot a bottle from a hundred feet away.”

Morrigan smiled and shrugged. “I guess he missed back in the warehouse,” Marco smiled back and opened the door. “Imagine that,” Morrigan added.

“And Morrigan?” Marco turned one last time. “I think you should tell Luke the truth soon. Telling him you're immortal, or whatever. I'm sure that would ease the stress off him knowing that he can't lose you.”

Morrigan reeled back in shock. He did see her get shot back in the warehouse! She couldn't say anymore before Marco ducked out and made his way out of the F.B.I building.

“I think he already has an inkling that something's terribly wrong...” Morrigan said to the air. It was way too far back in time for her to reverse and fix, she’d mess something up majorly if she did that. So she decided to leave it. But, if rumor started to sprout up of a gorgeous woman immune to bullets well,

The Calamity would just have to kill Marco.

THE END :D

**Author's Note:**

> Heh... You've made it far, young one. You have the making of an AID.


End file.
